


I'd Rather Go Blind

by IMANTSINMYEYESJOHNSON



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Attempt at Humor, Banter, Blindness, F/F, F/M, Fluff and Smut, Future Fic, M/M, Magical Stiles Stilinski, Oblivious Derek, Oblivious Stiles, Protective Derek, Rimming, Slow Burn, Spark Stiles Stilinski, Time Travel, Top Derek Hale/Bottom Stiles Stilinski, Witches, but it's temporary, eh it's not that slow it's only 4 chapters, hint at bottom derek hale though, sorta - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-10
Updated: 2018-05-01
Packaged: 2019-04-20 23:22:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 24,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14271783
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IMANTSINMYEYESJOHNSON/pseuds/IMANTSINMYEYESJOHNSON
Summary: Witches? They're the worst. Supernatural Asshats, really.They're the reason Derek's been trailing behind Stiles like an overprotective guard dog for the past four hours. And Derek? He's really nice to look at, don't get Stiles wrong, but he needs some goddamn alone time. The kind of alone time where he can think about said guard dog in very sinful ways, but he can't do that if Derek's got a leash on him.In which Stiles and Derek keep getting abducted by time travelling witches, Stiles loses his sight, finds out he has magical powers, and maybe feelings are discovered along the way.Inspired by the song I'd Rather Go Blind by Etta James. Somehow, it's nothing like the song. Go figure.





	1. I'd Rather Go Blind

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Español available: [I'd Rather Go Blind (Traducción)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15286344) by [Igni1LB](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Igni1LB/pseuds/Igni1LB)



> To anyone who's waiting for an update on my other fic who happens upon this, I'M SORRY. I'M REALLY SORRY. I promise an update is coming, it's not going to be abandoned I PROMISE.   
> And to those who haven't read it and don't want to, that's cool. You do you my guys. This fic is already done and has 4 chapters. It will be updated every Tuesday, time undetermined. So if you like this, hey, keep up.   
> Thanks for reading (:

There really is something uniquely special about traipsing through the forest at night when you're not supposed to.

"This is a monumentally bad idea," Scott informs Stiles with a pout.

Stiles scoffs. "Of course it is, that's why we're doing it. They'll never see it coming."

Scott lets out a disgruntled sigh as he follows Stiles deeper into the preserve.

"Relax, dude. We go in, take some snaps of the weird tree carvings, look for clues, and leave. In and out, real quick."

"We've already been walking for like fifteen minutes."

Stiles throws his hands up in the air. "Semantics!"

"I don't know, Stiles. Remember the last time we snuck out to check out a crime scene in the woods?"

"Um, you got turned into a super awesome crime-fighting werewolf, so… you're welcome? Also, this is _totally_ different. This time my dad _told_ me about it, like, face to face. He probably expected me to go and investigate because it's super weird, like, crazy summoning demons weird. Totally my area. It's all out in the open, Scotty."

They reach the glorified 'crime scene' and Stiles whips out his phone to start taking pictures.

This is normal now: investigation, research, preparation. After high school, the pack had worked to perfect an organized system so everyone was better prepared for the next supernatural danger. Stiles was the mastermind behind most of it, but he's also the only one to take it seriously, so, _here we are_.

A hiker had found a strange shrine on the west side of the preserve. Sigils were carved into the trees surrounding a small parting between the boles of trees where at the center there was an extinguished firepit built of stones. According to his dad, several small animals were found slaughtered around the area as well as six liters of blood around the pit, give or take. Testing is still being done to determine whether the blood is human or not. So, what is Stiles to do other than go and check it out for the pack?

" _Out in the open?!_ " Scott cries mid-flash as Stiles snaps a picture. "You said if I told _Allison_ about this you'd tell her about the time I puked in the mall fountain when I got food poisoning."

Stiles stands from his crouched position to clap a hand on Scott's shoulder. "And we're all very proud of you for this massive improvement in your character. I think this is the first time you haven't caved to those adorable dimples. Next, we'll work on those infuriating wounded puppy eyes that you use against everyone."

"Well, you see, about that…"

"Idiots!" he hears… _Derek_. _Oh my God_. Derek. Derek yelled that, which means he knows they're here, which means _Scott told Allison_ and Allison told Derek because she's still got a hankering for proving to Derek she's trustworthy.

"Traitor," Stiles whispers, turning his narrowed eyes on Scott.

Derek, Allison, and the three lupine musketeers all emerge from the darkness of the woods. He _swears_ they follow Derek around like a bunch of obsessed groupies.

Derek reaches out with one hand to grab Stiles' collar and shakes gently. Sort of. Not really.

"I told you," Derek growls, "not to come out here. It's either a trap or it's a worthless waste of time."

"Well, we won't know until we check it out," Stiles hastily reasons.

Derek gives him another shake and his glare intensifies. "So you leave it to the pack, moron."

"I'm not pack? Derek, I'm _wounded._ "

"Uh, we have a problem," Stiles hears Erica call from behind them.

Derek is too busy conveying how pissed he is with his eyebrows and breathing furiously through his nostrils to notice. That used to be intimidating. Not so much anymore.

"Fine, _werewolves,_ " Derek reluctantly corrects. "You have a death wish."

"No, Derek, seriously we have an issue!"

Before either of them have time to reply, a glowing white orb springs from the darkness and hits Derek in the shoulder, subsequently knocking him forward and forcing him to release Stiles. His Henley catches fire where the orb had hit and Derek pats it down.

Four women begin to materialize and disappear at will around them, flinging the strange energy balls at the pack. So since Stiles' only defense is to run and/or hide, what better way to do that than to stop, drop, and roll until he's using Erica as a human shield? The answer: there is no better way. Except that the women keep disappearing and reappearing to avoid attacks, throwing white fireballs from unexpected places as they go. There's not much for the werewolves to do except lunge wildly hoping to catch one, Allison shooting arrows wildly, and luck is not on their side.

It's not the worst situation they've been in.

"There are worse ways I could be spending my Friday night," Stiles shrugs from behind Erica.

"Oh, yeah genius? What's worse than magical explosives being thrown at you?"

"Sitting around my apartment, alone, stuffing myself with Kraft Mac-n-Cheese and bingeing Cheers."

Erica turns her head and frowns in disgust. "Ugh, that _is_ worse."

"See?!"

An orb hits the tree a few inches away from Stiles' head, bursting into flames.

"What in the fresh hell are these things?" Scott yells out, trying his best at this supernatural dodgeball.

"Witches!" Derek shouts, dodging another attack.

"I think we've established that the crime scene was not worthless, Derek!" Stiles _has_ to yell, for the sake of being right and for everyone to know he's right. Because he is.

"Stiles, get out of here!" Derek roars, sprinting to tackle a blonde woman just before she dematerializes in a puff of smoke.

Erica turns and kicks him (gently, as Erica will later maintain) in the shin and yells at him to run.

Stiles has to steady himself on a tree before he can get his feet under him enough to set a good pace, but then long skinny fingers wrap around his bicep and yank him back till he's face to face with one of the witches.

It's a redhead with shining deep auburn hair and a mottle of freckles across her pixie-like face. She's even got a Kate Mara thing going on if Kate had gotten a perm to rival Merida, with her hair pumped up with voluminous ringlets to frame her face. Stiles might even think she was hot if she wasn't terrifyingly evil _and trying to murder the entire pack._

"There you are," she hums in a velvety soft voice. She smiles and it's sharp and terrifying, reminding Stiles _way too much_ of shark week.

He hears his name being shouted and sees Derek barreling towards them, wolfed out, and then everything goes black.

He wakes up in some sort of cellar, with cold dirt floors and stone walls and duct tape slapped over his mouth. He counts two women, the redhead and another with short wavy blonde hair, presumably one of the witches who was attacking them in the forest. He thinks he counted two more in the woods, but it's impossible to know for sure.

Bony hands hold his arms up easily as he's chained to the wall. He looks over to a fuming, wolfed out, Derek who's ripping at his chains relentlessly. Duct tape once covered his mouth too, but two precise holes mark where his fangs have pierced it and now it hangs limply to the side of his chin.

"Honey," the redheaded woman says, examining her manicured black nails, "those cuffs are unbreakable. They've been charmed." And then the two women look at each other in silent communication.

Stiles tries to rebuttal, stupidly, but his reply is muffled by the tape.

The blonde rolls her eyes, marches over, and rips the duct tape off his mouth, which, _ow._

His immediate words are: "Lady, you're gonna' regret taking that off."

"You really are," Derek adds, shaking his head until his piece of tape falls completely off of his face.

"And why is that?" she asks, unamused.

Derek snorts. "Because he'll talk you into an early grave."

Stiles nods with his eyebrows arched and lips pursed. He really shouldn’t be trying not to laugh, especially when he's probably about to have some fucked up ritual performed on him.

_Still better than an average Friday,_ he thinks.

"I really will," he agrees, a sly grin blooming between his cheeks. "And I also have great ideas." The two witches tilt their heads in confusion at him. He turns his head to face Derek. "Derek, if you howl, the pack might find where we are."

Realization passes over Derek's face and he nods, then bows his head back to let out a booming, earth-rattling howl.

If they're anywhere near Beacon Hills, the pack will find them.

The redhead pushes the blonde's shoulder and bickering ensues. "Nice going Jenny, now we're on a time constraint."

And Stiles takes this time to reconcile the fact that if he survives this, Derek is probably going to kill him anyway.

He turns his head to face Derek as best he can and says, "Um… sorry?"

Stiles is absolutely not sorry, but he does his best to look contrite. He just doesn't want to die.

Derek looks at him deadpan.

"Oh, it's alright, you just went behind my back to do something that was monstrously stupid, even for you, _and dangerous,_ for a mediocre reason and now it's blown up in your face. Spectacularly."

"Everything I do is spectacular. _I'm_ spectacular."

"Agree to disagree."

The blonde Jenny turns to them with a murderous look in her eyes. "Shut up or you'll get a fireball to the face," she seethes. "It won't kill you, but it'll hurt like hell."

"Is that supposed to scare me?" Stiles is a liar. That definitely scares him.

"How about I rip your little boyfriend's face off?" The redhead jests. A sharp, evil smirk spreads slowly across her bony face. She steps forward and grabs Derek's chin between her thumb and forefinger, but he rips it away with a grunt of disgust.

"What the fuck? We're not dating! We're not even friends! I'm pretty sure if he had the option, he'd rather kill me than you!" Stiles squeaks, flailing his arms as much as the restraints permit him, jostling the chains as he goes.

Derek gives him a scandalized look. "I would not!"

"Oh. My. God. You know what, you crazy witch-bitches? Go ahead, kill us both. Just get it over with."

"Stiles!"

"What?! It's not like they're going to let us live anyways."

"Both of you! Is there any situation in which you aren't bickering?"

Both Stiles and Derek pause to look at each other. "Not really," Stiles answers with a shrug.

So, yeah, they seem a little too calm for being restrained with charmed shackles and chains in a mysterious dark and dank cellar that looks like a torture chamber straight out of the best-selling novel _Dracula_ but sue them. It's been just a few years short of a decade since Scott was bitten and everyone is pretty seasoned by now in dealing with life or death situations. Depressing? Maybe. Is sarcasm the only way Stiles can deal with any kind of trauma? Definitely.

God, when did he get so nihilistic?

"Why Stiles?" Derek snarls. "You have the alpha, okay, but why Stiles? You could have taken any of us."

Jenny, picking at her eerily gothic nails,  glances up towards Derek with one eyebrow dubiously raised. "You really think our focus was on you, Alpha? You're an afterthought. We're here for Stiles."

"What?!" Stiles jerks, eliciting a glare from the werewolf next to him. "No, no, no, I haven't done anything!"

"Not yet," the redhead grumbles.

Something clears over Jenny's eyes and she's suddenly wide-eyed and frantic. "Rowan," she hisses at the redhead, "he doesn't even know he's a spark yet! This violates our code."

"What is a spark," Stiles whispers to Derek, who doesn't even acknowledge his existence, as per usual.

The redhead, Rowan, turns to glare at her. "That doesn't matter!"

"Hey!" Derek shouts at the witches. They jump apart from each other and turn their glares onto Derek. "Stiles isn't a spark. He's just a human."

"What is a spark?!"

Rowan lifts a hand threateningly as her eyes go black, smoke curling up out of her palm and irises. She points accusingly at Stiles as she faces Derek. "In three years he will decimate our coven. We had an alliance and he _slaughtered_ us!"

Stiles' eyeballs nearly pop out of his head. "I _what?!_ " He drops his head to the hard wall behind him with a thump and groans indignantly.

_Oh, this is just great._ So he's chained to a wall next to King of The Wild Things, being accused of murder he hasn't even committed yet by _time travelling witches_ from the _future_ (and he would very much like to see the DeLorean, thank you) because apparently, he is a spark--whatever the fuck that is. What even is his life?

"We could drain him of his spark," Jenny says and Stiles has no idea what that means, but it's evidently very bad because Derek blanches and turns to Stiles with a wild, terrorized look in his eyes.

Rowan steps closer to Stiles, her smoky black gaze considering; he can even smell the remnants of ash and charcoal from her retinas. "No. He would likely still die being so young and Celine wants to be present at his time of death. She will likely just make it quick and painless."

Stiles gapes, faintly hearing the rattling of chains beside him and frantic growling.

Well at least they don't want him to suffer, he thinks?

"How could he have grown so powerful in only three years? He would have to be some kind of savant to finish his training so soon. How do we know this is truly the one we're looking for?"

Rowan rolls her eyes and stands with her arms akimbo to face Jenny. "How could it not be him?"

"Maybe we're in the wrong timeline. What if he's just human? This seems wrong," Jenny tries to reason.

"Yes!" Stiles shouts. "Yep, because I have no idea what the hell anyone is saying at this point and I'd really like to keep living."

"Celine was right about you, Jenny," Rowan points in anger, the smoke pouring from her eyes intensifying, "you're weak and you can't make tough decisions for the coven. How could we know whether this is the right Stiles or not? Stop stalling."

"Stop making excuses to break the code!" Jenny protests. "There must be a way. What if we got him to show us his spark?"

Rowan turns to Stiles and it's utterly disturbing how well emotions still translate on her face when her eyes are just deep black holes of ash and suffering. She's emoting what Stiles thinks is intrigue and a whole lotta sadism.

"The spark can be triggered by pain," Rowan considers. "We could find his father? Knock him around a bit. If his heart goes it's more of a natural cause wouldn't you say?"

Stiles feels like the world is about to implode. He straightens his back, ready to protest, but it's obvious shit's just hit the fan and he can barely swallow let alone speak.

"I have a better idea," Jenny says, pushing her shiny hair behind her ear and practically making a dive towards Derek and Stiles.

Stiles flinches and tries to cover his most important parts the best he can, but when no pain comes, he opens his eyes in confusion.

Jenny's tongue is deep in Derek's mouth, her dainty yet strong fingers holding his chin in place. Stiles didn't think he could ever say there was such a thing as an angry make out session but he's witnessing it, and even though Derek's not quite reciprocating, he can't help but feel like his heart is sinking.

His stomach churns with the familiar awful feeling of disgust because it's definitely not jealousy. Definitely _not_. Nope, no jealousy here. "Ew gross," he groans.

Jenny jumps backwards as Derek wolfs out, fangs snapping at her where they would have torn her lips off if she hadn't jumped out of the way in time. She wipes her face with a triumphant grin and says, "I've always wanted to do that."

Rowan still has Stiles pinned under her scrutinizing gaze as she moves in like a hawk, scraping her taloned fingers gently down his cheek. He can smell the ash of the smoke billowing out of her like an inferno was inside her and she looks at him like he's a bomb about to go off.

"Would you like another show or will you show us your spark?" she asks sweetly.

Was that supposed to make him jealous? _Why does everyone think they're a thing?!_

Stiles cranes his neck to get away from her, but the action doesn't accomplish much. She follows with ease, a finesse in her movements. "I'd rather go blind," Stiles spits, glaring at Jenny who watches him from across the room.

Footsteps echo down the hallway and all four heads swivel towards the noise before Rowan turns back to Stiles to smile sweetly at him. Enigmatically, she murmurs, "Okay," and then waves a hand in front of his face, a golden glow trailing behind it.

_Oh, great!_ Now they're casting weird hand-glowy spells on him! And he still doesn't even know what a spark is!

The echoes down the hall grow louder and Rowan backs up to take the hand of Jenny and they're gone in a small poof of black smoke. A second later Scott and Allison rush in, guns metaphorically blazing, only to see that there are no witches to fight. Just two losers chained to a wall.

Seeing that there is no threat, Scott and Allison visibly relax but before anyone can say anything Stiles throws his head back and yells, "What the _fuck_ is a spark?!"

Derek sags against his chains and groans.

 

* * *

   


"Okay, now that I have everyone's attention," Stiles announces, shooting a glare towards the werewolf he just threw a pen at. _Cough, Jackson, cough._ "Can someone _please_ tell me what the hell a spark is?"

Derek called everyone in for a pack meeting as soon as Scott and Allison pried them free of the chains. Well, Allison picked the locks while Scott kept rattling the chains in frustration. Now it's technically Saturday, and also technically morning, and absolutely _no one_ is happy to be huddled up in Derek's living room talking about this brand new shit show. So naturally, Stiles commandeers the meeting.

"A spark is someone with natural magical abilities," Derek grumbles, finally giving in

"Wait, I'm magic?"

"You're not _magic_ , Stiles. You're not a spark."

"How would you know?" Stiles snaps. "Those psychos seemed pretty convinced I'm magical _and_ powerful enough to destroy a whole coven."

Derek crosses his arms over his chest defensively, as if Stiles questioning his ability to _know_ this has really brought Derek down a peg. That's laughable. "Have you been doing any magic lately, Stiles? No? There's no definitive way that I know of to tell, but if you were one I think I'd know."

And then a throat clears. A distinctly feminine voice that can rip any man to shreds with just one remark. A goddess, with a heart as cold as Cocytus. All eyes land on Lydia, who is innocently reading Vogue, legs crossed primly over the ottoman.

When she notices the room has gone silent, she places the magazine in her lap and looks around, supremely _done_ with everyone.

"What?" Lydia snaps. "I'm not omniscient. I don't know everything."

Stiles scoffs. "No, but you're basically the living, breathing, encyclopedia of Britannica. I wouldn't be surprised if you knew stuff about this."

Lydia sniffs, flicking a perfect red lock behind her shoulder. "I would have gone with Wikipedia, there's a five-point-three million difference in the number of articles available."

Stiles waves his in a way he hopes conveys, _do you see my point?!_

And she replies with a look that definitely says, _you're a special kind of idiot, Stiles_. He's seen that look many times and he takes pride in the fact that it's reserved for only him. He is simultaneously flattered and offended.

Lydia goes back to flicking through her beauty magazine, surreptitiously listening to the conversation.

"Stop flirting and focus," Derek orders, glare flicking between Lydia and Stiles. Erica snickers from where she's perched on the couch, lips smacking on a cherry lollipop, but is instantly hushed by Derek's murderous gaze. Damn Grumpy, _okay._ "Witches are after one of the pack, possibly all of us, and we need a game plan."

"They made it pretty clear they were only after me," Stiles says grimly.

"Yes, but we have to treat this like the whole pack is in danger. There's no doubt they'll be back for you."

"I say we hand him over gift wrapped," Jackson sneers. Derek snaps his teeth at him.

"Why are they after Stiles anyway if he's just human?" Isaac inquires.

Derek closes his eyes and lets out a long, suffering sigh. "Apparently, three years from now, Stiles kills some of the witches in their coven, whom we've supposedly set up an alliance with. They've come back to kill him before he discovers he's a spark, or so they say."

Allison frowns. "That doesn't sound like Stiles."

"No, it doesn’t."

Stiles raises his hands in defense. "Hey, to be fair, I'd have no problem killing off a coven if they're evil."

Erica snorts. "Them and their great balls of fire seem pretty evil to me."

Out of the corner of his eye, Stiles sees Lydia lower her magazine again, a look of interest in her eyes, finally a puzzle to solve. "Not necessarily," she reasons. "Not if they're just trying to save their coven."

"But Stiles wouldn't just kill a bunch of innocent people!" Scott argues.

"No," Lydia replies, thoughtful. "But if they were so hellbent on killing Stiles to save their coven, they already would have. He can't heal, he has no special abilities that we know of, it would have been easy for them."

"Not if there are a pack of wolves protecting him," Scott rebuttals.

"Jenny, the blonde one, she was reluctant when Derek and I were held captive," Stiles supplies. "Something about a code, because I didn't know I was a spark. She didn't think I was the one who did it."

"Witches have a code, just like hunters, not to kill the innocent," Derek says.

"We're missing something," Lydia says, glossy pink lips wrapped around a pen. Her eyes go vacant for a moment, looking off to the side as she thinks, and suddenly they come into focus. "We should capture one, get information."

" _No,_ " Derek orders, nose wrinkling in disgust and eyes wild, "if we see one, we kill them on sight, understand?"

"I'm on board with Derek. I want to live," Stiles adds.

Scott, of course, has to argue. "Guys, what if we could help everyone? If they're not evil, we don't have to kill them. It would be pretty useful having a few witches on our side."

"No," Derek repeats, stern.

"I agree with Scott," says Lydia, surprisingly. "We shouldn't piss them off any more than we already have, it'll just make it more dangerous for Stiles and the rest of the pack. How much do you even know about witches, Derek?"

The Alpha only glares, jaw clicking shut, his teeth grinding through a scowl.

Lydia hums triumphantly. "That's what I thought. We need more information."

The pack is silent for several long moments before Lydia sits up straighter, raising her eyebrow, daring them to challenge her next words.

"Because this pack is a democracy and not a dictatorship," she says slowly, shooting a meaningful glance towards Derek, "let's take a vote. All in favor of acquiring more information before any serious actions."

Allison and Scott raise their hands of course, as well as Jackson, who will forever follow Lydia's orders like the puppet he is. Surprisingly, Isaac raises his hand, which earns him a broad grin from Scott. The only ones not to raise their hands are Derek, Stiles, Erica, and Boyd.

Lydia's hands settle firmly in her lap. "That settles it, five against four. We need more information." She looks towards Derek imperiously, chin raised, her green eyes challenging. "Let's research some witches."

"We should call Deaton," Scott suggests, and it's the very best thing Stiles has heard all night.

So Stiles pulls out his phone, unlocks the screen, and is faced with a jumble of blurry black lines on white that he can't read no matter how hard he focuses his eyes. He brings the phone farther away from his face until the letters clear and he's finding Deaton's contact with his arm all the way outstretched with his eyes slightly squinted.

"Stiles? Are you okay?" Allison asks, perceptive as always.

"Um, yeah. I think I might need reading glasses, though," Stiles says, hitting call for Deaton. "No big deal."

Scott hums, a delicate frown over his worried eyes. "Maybe you hit your head? Are you dizzy?"

"No, I'm fine, I swear."

Stiles looks up at Derek as the line rings in his ear to find the Alpha watching him, expressionless. Never a good sign.

In the end, Deaton doesn't answer and Jackson storms out of Derek's house purely because he's a drama queen.

"Well, I guess that concludes this week's episode of _The Young and the Sleepless,_ " Stiles announces, slapping his knees and standing up with a yawn.

"That wasn't funny at all," Erica mumbles.

"Everything is funny when you haven't slept in twenty-four hours," Stiles says, doing a crappy imitation of jazz hands. "I'm heading home. Goodnight everyone."

He waves in the general direction of the remaining pack before Derek takes hold of his wrist and halls him back.

"You're not going anywhere," he says, like it was obvious and he's somehow wronged by even having to say it. "There's a bunch of pissed off witches out there trying to murder you. We have to keep you under surveillance."

Stiles scoffs, making a poor attempt to rip his hand away. It doesn't work. "If they knew where I lived then why would they have set a trap? They would have just poofed themselves into my room and killed me there." Derek is taken aback for a moment before composing himself. "I'm. Going. Home." Because the last thing Stiles needs is to be reminded _more_ often about how much this beautiful man is irritated by him.

"No," Derek says, clear and concise, right in his face with a glare that could shoot down a fighter jet.

"Derek's right," Erica pipes up, spearing her arms through the sleeves of a tight leather jacket, "it's too risky to be without the pack watching out for you. Leaving you alone would be like offering you up on a silver platter." Boyd nods beside her.

Stiles sighs and deflates, eventually nodding.

" _Fine,_ " he concedes, finally ripping his wrist free only because Derek loosened his grip.

Stiles stumbles back a few inches, losing his balance after Derek having returned some of his inertia. He rubs his wrist tenderly, but Derek's grip had never been hard enough to leave a mark.

"But let the record show that I am _not_ happy about this." By the time he's finished voicing his complaints, everyone but Isaac and Derek has filed out the door. Isaac shoots them a strange look before heading to the finished basement, converted into a separate sound-proofed apartment. Sometimes Isaac creeps Stiles out a little.

But it's fine.

Everything's _fine_.

Especially now that Stiles and Derek are alone. All alone. Standing several feet apart in an awkward silence that makes Stiles kind of want to drown himself.

"You can take the guest room," Derek grunts, gesturing down the hall.

"Thanks," Stiles says quietly. He follows the motion quickly, rushing awkwardly to the guest room. "And I don't need a babysitter!"

"Yes you do," Derek calls.

Stiles whips around with an indignant squawk to find Derek smiling, head tipped down like he's embarrassed by the thing.

His chest freezes up and he quickly turns back and slams the guest room's door shut behind him. That man has _no business_ being so adorable. _None._

 

* * *

  


The next morning, Stiles wakes up to a kick in the shin.

"Get up, we're going to Deaton's."

"Ow!" he yells, because he knows it's Derek and he lives to displease.

"That didn't hurt," Derek deadpans, stretching up to his full height over Stiles and crossing his arms.

It didn't, but as previously stated, Stiles lives to displease.

"Yes, it did. You're such a _dick._ "

Snuggled up in the soft, billion thread count sheets--which, if this is the sheets he puts in the guest bedroom, what are Derek's _own_ sheets like?--and blanketed by the warm morning sunshine coming in from the window, Stiles lazily rolls over to face Derek.  
Well. He thinks it's Derek?

Really it's just a tall blob of grayscale and olive-toned colors that match Derek's size and taste.

Stiles squints. "Why are you so blurry?"

The blob shifts. "What are you talking about _now_?" He can practically hear the eye roll. Yep, that's definitely Derek.

Stiles rolls and sits up, rubbing his eyes to clear them of their sleep but it does nothing. The entire room is just a snafu of colors and shapes like a Kandinsky painting.

Stiles rubs his forehead and pulls at the T-shirt that he really needs to change. He's starting to smell.

"I think I need to see an optometrist."

"Something's wrong with your eyes?"

Stiles sighs, remembering his difficulty reading through his contacts the night before. "Yeah. You remember when I couldn't find Deaton's contact without holding the phone far away? I think it's gotten worse."

Without warning, Derek grabs his arm and pulls him to his feet, dragging him to the door. The sudden anxiety that hits him feels akin to someone who's got his chest in a vice-tight grip. "We're going to go see Deaton, _now._ "

Stiles rips his arm away, because his grip was actually starting to hurt that time, but with his impaired sight he backs into what he presumes is a table and knocks himself and the table over. This whole sight deterioration thing is starting to get to him.

"You can't just grab me!" Stiles wheezes from where he's sprawled out on the floor. "I can barely see!"

The towering dark blob pauses.

"I'm sorry," Derek says, sincerely, and a hand finds his to pull him to his feet.

Holy shit, Derek just _apologized._ Hello, eighth wonder of the world, Stiles has discovered you.

They're already halfway to Deaton's when Stiles pieces it all together.

"The witches," he mumbles, eyes deer-like as they stare at the vast blue expanse of sky outside Derek's windshield, "they cast a spell on me when I said I'd rather go blind than… yeah. I think. Yeah."

Derek exhales forcefully in annoyance and Stiles hears the accelerator whine under Derek's insistent foot.

  


* * *

  


"The good news," is the first thing Deaton says after Stiles and Derek have finished explaining their dilemma, "is that I think I can fix your sight."

"Awesome! Alright, do what you gotta' do doc. Give me some weird obscure root to eat that makes me shit glitter or whatever it is that you've got planned. I have research I need to do and I can't be reading like this."

Derek face palms and Stiles grins impishly.

The rest of the pack, Stiles' dad included, are already en route, but Stiles was too anxious to wait. Like 80% of his brainpower functions on sight. And it's because of _reading_ not _porn_ thank you very much.

"The bad news. The antidote to this spell is incredibly dangerous if not prepared correctly and it is very difficult to prepare. You could end up with internal bleeding."

Stiles groans and has to physically steel himself as to not flail around blindly.

"Judging from what you've told me, Stiles, this is progressing very quickly. I suspect you'll be completely blind by tomorrow morning."

Stiles has no idea how he's supposed to feel about that. Then there's a heavy hand on his shoulder dolling out comfort that he suspects is Derek's and suddenly he's too distracted by the warmth blooming in his chest than to worry about something as trifling as temporary blindness.

"No potion," Derek says, and _hello? When did Derek get a say in Stiles' bodily autonomy?_

"Um, no? You don't get a say. I need to be able to see."

Derek growls so deeply Stiles can feel the vibrations travel down from Derek's hand and into his shoulder. "Did you not just hear Deaton? You could die. We're not doing it."

"Well, what am I supposed to do?! Be blind for the rest of my life?!"

"Actually," Deaton interrupts, "the spell will wear off in about a month, maybe only a couple of weeks, but in this case, I agree with Stiles. With a coven out for vengeance trying to capture and kill him, his chances are better if he can see his surroundings."

"I can protect him," Derek argues, hand tightening on Stiles' shoulder.

The door bursts open and there are voices and footsteps and Derek's hand disappears so quickly it's like it was never there.

"What about the witches?" Derek speaks up over the clamor, stealthily changing the subject while he can. The pack hushes.

Apparently, they're not revisiting the whole magical potion thing. Kay.

An arm slips around Stiles' shoulders that's considerably slimmer than Derek's but still toned. The blurry outline reveals none other than Scott. He'd recognize that floppy dark hair anywhere.

Deaton takes a deep breath and lets it out as if he's about to dish out a long-term secret.

Turns out, he is.

"Well, they're right. Stiles is a spark."

" _Excuse me?!_ " Stiles and his father exclaim at the same time.

"I'm not- I'm- I'm just human! I'm not anything!"

"No, you're definitely a spark," Deaton says resolutely.

"With all due respect, Deaton," Derek says, "if he were a spark, then why haven't we been able to smell any magic on him?"

_Wolves can smell magic?_

"Because he hasn't been practicing. Sparks can only access their powers if they _believe_ them to exist. Something in Stiles is still doubtful about the supernatural world, or perhaps himself and his own abilities."

"Hi, still in the room," Stiles waves.

He is ignored.

"Wait," he hears his dad begin shakily, "so you're telling me that my son is magical?"

"Yes, exactly. Stiles has inherited his spark from Claudia, his mother, whom I've always suspected of being a spark."

"I inherited magic from my mom? _Sweet._ "

"This means Stiles has the innate ability to manipulate the elements, bend matter to his will, and if he's powerful enough, effect entropy."

"Are you saying that I could have been throwing fireballs and going all Charlie Mcgee everywhere, all this time?!"

"That's one way to look at it."

Derek steps in front of Stiles. He can tell by the sudden wall of black that's blocked his view of… nothing. The clinic is just one big mess of swirly colors and lights.

"What are we supposed to do about the witches?" Derek asks angrily. Damn that dude is abrasive to _everyone._

There's a boom of something heavy dropping and the soft susurrus of pages being flipped. "Time travelling and teleportation requires an immense amount of power. Most witches are physically unable to possess that level of power without turning into literal monsters. What did these witches look like?"

"They were pretty hot," Stiles supplies and _God_ he can _feel_ the glares he gets from the pack.

"They looked like normal women," someone who sounds suspiciously like Boyd corrects. "Definitely not monster-like."

"So they must have an external factor they're drawing power from, likely an amulet of some kind. Did any of you notice any jewelry on any of the women? How large was the coven?"

"It was hard to tell," Derek explains, "they kept disappearing and reappearing. I think I counted four, but there were only two when Stiles and I were taken."

"Okay, if you're unfortunate enough to run into them again, look for any sort of strange broaches, pendants, or rings with an hourglass on it. Once they're no longer in possession of it, they won't be able to teleport, there you should be able to hold one of them long enough to get the information you need." If Stiles squints enough, he can see Deaton handing Derek a large book the cover, the color of aged leather. "This book has the most information on covens in my library, it should be able to help you. In the meantime, I suggest Stiles be with one of the wolves at all times, for protection."

Stiles balks. "I'm not a child," he says petulantly.

"We're just trying to protect you, dude."

"I'm an adult-"

"Derek volunteers!" Erica shouts, subsequently sending several other wolves into a fit of giggles.

Wow, _really_ funny. Forcing Stiles to spend time with the hottest guy in the universe that just so happens to hate him. _Hilarious._

"I'll do it," Derek agrees sullenly. "I'm the Alpha, it's my responsibility. I don't have a job or classes that I need to attend, but all of you do."

"Hello? What part of adult don't you understand? I can take care of myself."

Derek turns around and because his eyebrows are a beacon in the darkness, he can see the judgement even through the blur. "You're still talking?"

Stiles can't think of anything other than to scoff.

A hand claps Stiles on the back, undeniably his father's. "It's a good idea, kiddo, for right now at least. You wouldn't wanna' give your old man a heart attack by going missing, would you?"

"Then why don’t I just stay with you?"

"Not that I wouldn't take the time off, but I just think Derek is more suited. I'm an old cop, no match for whatever shenanigans you kids are getting into lately." Stiles doesn't want his dad involved anyway, so that's a no go.

"Great. So once again, I am the helpless damsel in distress."

"Yup," Erica confirms, popping the P. She's obviously getting way too much amusement out of their collective suffering. Stiles' specifically.


	2. Bad Bad News

Derek believes his house is safer, so that's where he drives them back to, but Stiles can't imagine how it could be any safer than his own apartment, especially when he's knocking into things left and right. Stiles is used to navigating his apartment in the dark; getting up for midnight snacks, staying up all night online, 3 A.M. bathroom trips. He knows the layout of his place like the back of his hand. Derek's house? Not so much.

He's left to flounder around until he finds a wall to guide him, and after that wall ends, a table, or counter, or maybe another wall. He'd rebuilt the Hale house using the original floor plan and it was an old, _old_ house with a frankly confusing and impractical layout.

If this is how all old houses are made up, the three-hundred-year-old cottages that New England flaunts around must be _hell._

Derek still believes his house is safer than Stiles' own apartment even when Stiles gets bored and decides to explore the house, but ends up knocking over an entire bookcase and hearing the books fall to the ground under the loud boom the bookcase makes.

"Would it be ironic to say 'I'm watching you'," Stiles laughs weakly when Derek comes running to investigate the commotion.

Luckily, he doesn't end up trapped underneath but it certainly gets Derek up in arms muttering things like, _"fumbling idiot,"_ and _"going to get himself killed."_

And he's not even completely blind yet! So there's that to look forward to.

By the time night rolls around, it's gotten considerably harder to discern objects from one another. Colors have begun to fade and the lines he normally would be able to distinguish from one another have begun to blend together.

It's the third time he knocks into something Derek comes to the rescue. Well, 'knocking into something' would be a bit of an understatement.

Stiles is really fucking hungry, okay? Dude's gotta' eat.

So, as quietly as he can (as if he'll be able to sneak past an alpha werewolf), he gets up from the couch where he'd been listening to music and feels around the room for nearby guidance. He can do this.

Just as he thinks he's almost to the kitchen, his knee connects with a side table and everything clatters to the floor. He whips his arms out for balance, only to tumble to the floor too.

There's no way Derek didn't hear that. Embarrassment floods him yet again as he struggles to pick everything up and place it back on the table, patting his hands around on the ground until they find whatever object feels like it doesn't belong on the floor. The footsteps he hears coming from the end of the hall are obnoxiously light and slow, as if Derek is trying to hide the fact he's heard and coming to check on him. Stiles sits back on his knees and pouts childishly.

"I know you're here, you know," Stiles says, absolutely miffed. "I may be blind now but I'm not an idiot. I heard you come down the hall."

And then a warm hand settles over his shoulder, heavy and calming. "Sorry," Derek says, "I didn't know if you wanted help or not."

"Well, what do you think, hm?"

"The last time I tried to help you, you yelled at me and called me a patronizing asshole, so I really don't know."

Stiles grinds his teeth together. The confusing swirl of anger and affection in his chest is slowly driving him to insanity. He gesticulates with one arm wildly but ends up hitting a foreign object that'd fallen and he hears it rolling all the way across the floor. He sighs.

"I don't _want_ your help, but clearly I need it because _someone_ refuses to let me stay at my own apartment where I know where everything is. Or better yet, just let me drink Deaton's magic sight potion."

For a minute there, Stiles thinks he's won the argument because Derek says nothing to rebuttal. But then-  
"Here," he says warmly, and the hand on his shoulder his slides down his arm to his wrist and pulls him up. Derek has to steady him before guiding him back down the hall, taking both of his hands in his. Then, in a moment of quiet, those hands trail up his arms so softly Stiles has to suppress a shiver. They land on each of his shoulders, where Derek has come to stand close behind him.

"Is this alright?" Derek asks.

Stiles nods, a nervous lump rapidly growing in his throat. Derek's hands are surprisingly soft. It's nice being touched by them.

"I'm going to guide you, okay?"

Stiles nods again, and then, gentle as a feather, Derek nudges him forward. One hand on Stiles' shoulder slides down to his own hand and lifts it up until his fingertips glide across a wall as they walk together. Derek nudges him again to turn a corner, breath hitting the back of his neck, but Derek quickly distracts him by lifting his hand to connect with a tall piece of furniture, smooth and wooden, with drawers and circular handles.

"That's my dresser," Derek whispers and continues to guide him around the room. "That's the window," he says when Stiles' fingertips connect with the chilly, brittle, expanse of glass. A few steps to the right and Derek tells him to stop, guiding Stiles' hands to soft, silky sheets and a downey duvet. He doesn't need to explain that that's his bed.

Then he's being led down the hall again. One of his hands is sandwiched between Derek's while the other trails along walls and over doors. Derek instructs him to stop, but he's a second too late and bumps face first into Derek's chest.

"Shit! Sorry, sorry, I didn't mean-"

"You're fine," Derek amends, and is that? Is that a _smile_ he hears? Not an amused one but… one of affection? He probably shouldn't go down that road right now. "Here, I'll go behind you." Derek trails his hands over Stiles' shoulders so the human can know exactly where he is and where he's going. Those hands end up on his hips and Stiles feels his cheeks heat and he has to bite his lip just to keep from giggling. "This alright?"

"Yup!" Stiles says a tad bit too forcefully, but the hands don't disappear, so he figures he's safe.

Derek nudges him to take a step forward. "The living room, which is where you seem to have the most trouble," he snickers quietly.

"Shut up."

The living room takes a bit longer than the bedroom, since Stiles kept stopping out of fear of bumping into something.

"You have to trust me," Derek murmurs, outstretching their joined hands to show Stiles how much room he had to move. And he sounds so… so _calm._ It's a surprisingly welcome rumble that he can feel from Derek's chest to his back.

Stiles does trust Derek, implicitly, which is why he'd only stopped out of fear the first time. All of the other times was just an excuse to feel the solid muscle of Derek's body up against his, but good luck getting him to admit _that_.

The kitchen, Stiles expects, will be the most nightmarish.

It's not.

In fact, Derek gets even more touchy and Stiles just kind of wants to melt into a puddle onto the floor.

His fingertips skim the smooth surface of the marble counters, over the sink, and somewhere along the line one of Derek's arms had wrapped around Stiles' waist and his chin rested on his shoulder as his other hand had guided Stiles to each of the cabinets and their contents.

Yep. Stiles is going to fucking _die._

Derek doesn't get any less handsy as he guides Stiles through the rest of the first floor (anything that requires stairs was never even discussed, as stairs are a bad idea for Stiles even when he can see).

By the end of the tour, Derek's practically hugging Stiles to his chest and asks, "Do you think you got it or do you need another walkthrough? It's a lot to remember after one go."

And Stiles _means_ to say, 'Yes, actually. I don't remember a damn thing. Please show me fifteen more times.' What actually comes out of his mouth is a different story.

"Um, why are you being so… pleasant?"

Derek rips his hands away from Stiles as if he'd been burned.

_Nice going, idiot_ , his brain needlessly supplies for him. Damn, why does his brain to mouth filter always fail him at the worst of times?

"It's the least I could do," Derek replies, emotionless, like a robot. "It's my fault you're in this mess."

Uhh… No? Nope. That is some bullshit martyrdom right there and Stiles will not have it.

" _What?_ How? How is this even remotely your fault?"

Derek grunts in place of an actual human answer and Stiles is _this_ close to smacking him.

"Don't fucking grunt at me," Stiles snaps, "I can't read your face anymore so words are paramount now, you troglodyte."

"No."

"No, what?"

Oh, _wow._ Stiles did actually hear an eye roll. Amazing.

"No, I'm not going to answer that."

"Excuse me?"

"Go find something useful to do, Stiles. I'm going to go take a nap."

Before Stiles can come up with anything to reply to that, he hears Derek walking away.

"You're not even going to help me back to the living room?!" Stiles yells loud enough for it to echo around the space.

"I just gave you a tour!" Derek yells back, his own voice echoing. "Figure it out!"

"Thanks for all the help, asshole," Stiles grumbles, feeling around for a wall to guide him back.

 

* * *

 

Stiles wakes up the next morning completely blind and decides to make it his mission to memorize where everything is without making a mess. So he starts at the edge of the guest bed and counts the paces it takes to get from there to his suitcase and from his suitcase to the door.

It's seventeen paces from his room to the bathroom and another three to the toilet, two to the sink. Thirty paces to the living room couch, nine to the kitchen, eleven to the front door.

He does this for hours memorizing the layout of the house, half determined not to rely on Derek's surely well-meaning but fragile help and half out of boredom.

He keeps at it until Derek catches him gently around the wrist and says he made lunch.

"You have my whole house memorized now, huh?" Derek asks after an uncomfortably long beat of silence, both of them sitting at the kitchen table with a giant quesadilla in between them.

Stiles fights back a blush at the realization that Derek had most likely been watching him do this the entire time. What a shit.

"Well it's not like there's anything else to do around here," Stiles says in retaliation, but it's true. He can't peruse the internet anymore, or watch T.V., or read, and listening to music gets old after a while.

"Can you read braille?"

"What do you think?" Stiles asks, arching a dismissive eyebrow Derek's way and shoving a sour cream drenched slice into his mouth.

For a long moment Stiles thinks Derek isn't going to answer him, but then after hearing Derek's fingers drum against the surface, he says, "Okay," and that's the last they speak to each other for a few hours.

Stiles did _not_ expect to be woken up from his nap by the sound of something flat and solid hitting the table next to him.

"Derek?" Stiles snuffles, face pressed into the couch cushion.

Derek grunts an affirmative and gently steals Stiles' hand and guides it towards him. He places it at the base of his neck for Stiles to feel the solid muscle there, and his fingers grow a mind of their own and curl into the soft thin fabric of his shirt. And, okay, Stiles may be getting the hang of the whole no sight thing, but this _has_ to be a dream, which is weird because he's already dreaming in blindness. This is how about 30% of his fantasies with Derek start after all. With the touching and… yeah…

"What are you doing?" Stiles asks when Derek's grip on his wrist only tightens.

"Here," Derek murmurs, and then guides Stiles hand away from the _holy sweet jesus hot warm nice_ skin of his chest and places it onto something significantly harder and colder. "I burned you some stuff."

It's a small stack of CDs Stiles realizes. His hand is guided a bit to the left where he feels the player and the buttons that have the distinct shapes of play, pause, back, and skip raised. Finally, something he can operate, even if it is an early 2000's CD player.

"You did?" Stiles asks, shocked. "What is it?"

"You said you were bored so I took some podcasts and audiobooks and burned them onto CDs so you weren't just stuck with music. I also put some stand-up comedy in there, I think, since it's just listening to jokes, easier to follow. I don't know what your tastes are, so I just burned what I listen to, but if you want something specific I can play them for you."

Stiles' hands float over the top of the stack, his jaw slack.

"How long did this take you?"

"Uh, just a few hours."

" _Hours?_ "

"Yeah, is this okay?"

" _Yes._ Thank you? You're being like, insanely nice right now, oh my god. Also, you listen to podcasts? Which ones? Also what comedians do you like? You have a sense of _humor?_ "

"Shut up, Stiles, before I change my mind about being nice."

"Right. Shutting up."

Stiles is more than happy to oblige, sitting up and placing the first CD on the stack into the player and hitting play, placing the headphones into his ears and sighing in relief. It's an hour long Ted Talks series about extraterrestrial life.

Derek settles in next to him, so close that their thighs and shoulders touch and Stiles suddenly loses all ability to concentrate. His leg starts to bounce out of nerves but before he even notices a hand comes down on his knee to stop the movement and the weight of it anchors him to something warm and fuzzy. He can't help but smile then, letting himself lean into Derek's shoulder. Derek, surprisingly, doesn't push him away. He only settles further into the couch and puts an arm behind Stiles like he belongs there.

God, Stiles really misses Derek's face.

Oh. _Oh no._

 

* * *

 

The next couple of days go by surprisingly smoothly.

Okay, they go by as smoothly as they can be expected to, given that Stiles has lost a function.

It's not actually a big deal. He can do this.

He and Derek develop a comradery of sorts, where Stiles doesn't make jokes at Derek's expense and Derek is actually… really sweet. Like cavity-inducing sweet. He still isn't the talker that Stiles would look for in a conversationalist, but Derek blatantly goes out of his way for Stiles whenever he can--so long as Stiles doesn't comment on it, sarcastically _or_ genuinely.

It's when Stiles and Derek program his phone to respond to his demands and read search results to him, together, that he realizes how completely and utterly fucking fucked he is.

"Okay… so I just go into settings and then I press the sound button and it turns green?"

Derek is so _goddamn cute_ when he's frustrated, and if anything frustrates him, it's technology. Stiles has had to go over it already for Derek, but it's not getting any better. Last time Stiles checked, Derek still had a flip phone which is just blasphemous and yet endearing at the same time.

Stiles shakes his head, unable to hide his amusement. "No that just turns the ringer off and on. You have to find the voice command."

"Why couldn't you have just gotten that Sarah phone or whatever?" he grumbles.

Stiles snorts. "You mean Siri? That's Apple. I have an android."

"Whatever." Stiles squawks when Derek flicks him in the neck. Stiles hadn't even realized Derek had been sitting so close, so he kicks his legs out wildly until his foot connects with something soft and warm. Derek grunts and _bingo._ Stiles has successfully kicked Derek in the stomach. "I don't _have_ to help you with this."

For a moment Stiles freaks out internally, wondering if he'd crossed some sort of line, but then Derek snorts, his breath cutting off into quiet laughter. Derek is laughing. Derek is _laughing!_ Fuck he hates spells so much right now. He would give anything to see how divine that smile must be; the sound of it makes his heart feel so full it might just explode.

"You started it!"

"You started it, actually, by murdering a bunch of witches apparently."

"Not fair! Your aspersions wound me, Derek. I have done no such thing."

"Yet."

" _Yet,_ " Stiles agrees, giving one last kick to Derek's side with a shit-eating grin. He earns a huff and most likely a glare.

"I can't do this anymore. Let's just call Verizon and get them to do it." And Stiles barks a laugh so hard he has to hold onto his stomach as he topples over.

The physical attraction has always been there, no doubt, but the insistent tugging on his heart that spells affection, _love,_ when he thinks about Derek is getting harder and harder to ignore. Especially when he's around him lately.

He is _royally_ fucked. And not even in the fun way.

 

* * *

 

That night they come for him.

The witches come for him while he's alone in his bed half awake. The fuckin' cheats.

First, he hears a crash just outside his room and then the door is creaking open. He lifts himself up on his elbows, squinting his eyes in the dark only to remember that he won't see the intruder no matter how hard he squints.

"Derek?"

And then it all happens very fast.

There's the sound of frantic heavy footsteps running down the hall, Derek shouting his name. A hand is softly placed on his cheek and he's out cold.

Stiles wakes up hoping that he'd dreamed the whole thing, well, apart from the awesome Derek bonding time but _still._

It's not a dream. He's still blind and this time he's surprised to be waking up at all, since the witches have obviously taken him again. It's cold and smelly wherever he is, very much unlike Derek's house that is always a constant 65 degrees Fahrenheit and smells like caramel of all things. Speaking of which.

"Derek? You here, dude?"

The answer he gets is: "I swear to god if you call me dude again, witches will be the least of your problems."

" _Oh-kay._ I guess that's a yes."

Stiles tests his muscles, stretching out only to realize he's actually handcuffed to Derek. He gives an experimental tug only for Derek to get up close and personal and growl in his face. Alright. So Sourwolf has made an appearance for the night.

"Okay, so plan B," Stiles says

" _Plan B?!_ What was Plan A?" Derek hisses.

"… Not getting captured?"

It's palpable how close Derek is to reaching over and just throttling Stiles. Just like an average Tuesday, except he might actually die this time because these women seem pretty hellbent on killing him.

"Alright," Derek sighs, his weight shifting like he's slumping, "what's plan B?"

"Can you tell where we are?"

Derek takes a moment to consider. "In the tunnels somewhere under the Preserve. We can’t be too far from my house, that's where they took us last time, but they're extensive and confusing. My senses are overpowered because they've rubbed everything down with witch hazel."

Stiles snorts. Witch hazel, how fitting.

"The handcuffs are charmed, that's why I can't break them and my ankle's cuffed to the floor too. They've charmed my throat so I can't howl, either."

Stiles reaches down to pat at his pockets the best he can, searching for a phone that isn't there. "You don't have your phone?"

"If I did, would we be here right now?" Derek snarls.

He lets out a low breath, the kind you hold in when you have to do something _very_ unpleasant. "Okay," Stiles says, almost placating, "I need you to dislocate my thumb."

The handcuffs jerk, pulling Stiles with it. "What? No, I'm not doing that."

"Do you trust me?" Stiles asks, doing his best to look pleading. He's not sure how he's doing since he can't see Derek's reaction.

"No."

Stiles rubs his free hand down his face and groans. He knows what he has to do here, because the witches are going to kill him regardless, but if he can get away from Derek maybe they'll spare him. He can't picture himself living without Derek in his life and the thought of it leaves him feeling an aching hole in his chest.

Maybe if he keeps getting away, they'll go after Lydia or Scott or worse: his dad.

"I have a plan, but you have to trust me okay? No matter what, this thumb is coming out of its socket and if I have to do it myself I might end up doing more damage since I can't see what I'm doing."

Derek lets out a sound that Stiles can't decipher between a sigh of resignation and a growl. "What are you planning?"

If Stiles tells him, Derek won't help him.

"You have to trust me."

Derek makes that sound again, like he definitely doesn't trust him but tentatively wraps his hands around the one Stiles has cuffed, running his thumbs to the joining point of Stiles thumb and hand. Stiles bunches the collar of his shirt up into his mouth, knowing full well the pain will be excruciating enough to make him shout, but Derek pauses. Tenderly, he rubs his thumbs in small circles into Stiles' skin.

"I'm sorry," he says, "I thought I could protect you from them."

And then Stiles hears the nauseating pop before he feels it, but when he does he lets out a muffled wail, his teeth grinding against the damp cloth in between his teeth before he pants the pain into submission. Another sickening pop has him out of breath as he pushes the cuff over his dislocated joint, the metal scraping the skin enough to draw blood. The worst is over and the cuff drops to the floor, allowing Stiles the freedom to lie back and focus on his breathing to distract from the pain of his injury.

He can feel Derek's eyes on him as he stands, his injured hand cradled to his chest, the other darting out to feel along the cold, damp stone walls.

"What are you doing?" Derek asks when Stiles finds the exit, an archway with no door.

His hand traces the rim of it, feet scuffling forward, navigating by feel. There's a hallway, he thinks.

"Stiles? What are you doing?" Derek's voice sounds considerably tighter, like he's piecing together what Stiles is planning to do.

A lump rises in Stiles' throat as he replies, the adrenaline of what he's about to do making him shake like it's mid-December. "If you can get out of your cuffs," Stiles articulates the best he can between the shivers and his tightening throat, "you should run. But I think they'll let you go if they have me."

"Stiles," Derek warns and Stiles can hear the rattle of Derek pulling at the cuffs.

"Don’t let them come after my dad."

"Stiles, _no._ "

He knows it's time to go when Derek starts shouting at him, wrenching at his handcuffs like a madman. Stiles ignores him and finds himself shuffling down the tunnel, his hand guiding him. He starts to shout.

" _Hey! I'm here! You want me, come and get me!_ " There are whispers down the hall and he can still hear Derek screaming at him, the sound of the straining chains echoing through the cool air. " _Come on!_ "

He can hear the pitter patter of footsteps running towards him, but it's only one person.

Someone grabs him by the shoulder and suddenly the wall under his fingertips is gone and the air around him is warm, his head spinning like he'd closed his eyes and gone through a rollercoaster about ten times.

"You _idiot_ ," someone hisses. They're a she, but the voice isn't particularly familiar. "Are you _trying_ to get yourself killed?"

"No! I mean-yes. I don't _want_ to get killed but yes, that was the overall plan."

Whoever it is pushes him lightly on the shoulders, but hard enough for him to stagger back on his feet. It's then he realizes he's no longer in the tunnels where they'd taken him, since silence fills the room where Derek's loud protests should be. He's been teleported by one of the witches--but why is she helping him?

"Who are you?" Stiles demands, flinging his arm out for some sort of purchase but grabs nothing.

The woman sighs and places her hand over Stiles' eyes. A pleasant warmth flows through their contact, from her skin to his, like the current of a steady river and after a few moments, he can see the reddish hue his eyelids give when there's light shining through them. She lifts her hands away and it's her, the blonde witch from before, Jenny.

Her blue eyes rake over his face, gawking at him as if he were the one that was crazy.

He can't discern where he is, but it's indoors, in the living room of a house he hasn't seen before in his life. It looks like it hasn't been cleaned in years; it's not cluttered or messy, but there are water stains on the ceiling and dust cakes every surface in sight.

"It's you," Stiles says, astonished.

"Yup, it's me, and if you don't give me that hand of yours or your thumb will swell bigger than a potato."

She reaches for his injured hand but he jerks it away.

"Why should I trust you?"

Jenny scoffs. "If I wanted you dead, I wouldn't have brought you here."

And that tells Stiles exactly… nothing. Nope. Nada.

"So why are you helping me, hm? Aren't you lusting for vengeance like the rest of the Tabithas that want to gut me."

She sighs and makes another attempt at his hand. "It's a long story and I'll tell you after I fix your hand. And now that you've escaped we have to go back and get Derek. They'll use him as collateral."

_Shit. Derek._

Stiles nods, thrusting his hand at her. "Okay. Hurry."

She nods in return, lightly taking the joint between her hands. "This is going to hurt, but only for a moment." She doesn't give him much time to process, because she snaps his thumb back into place immediately after, the pop ringing in his ears like a bone breaking. He shouts, both in surprise and agony, but the pain fades as quickly as it comes.

He looks down and soft blue light is shining from her palms, so bright it burns his retinas and he's forced to look away.

"There," she says proudly, "all better."

He pulls his hand back and flexes his fingers, and sure enough, his hand is completely healed. It might even feel better than before with the residual energy of her magic still tingling in his skin. Then he remembers.

"Derek. We have to go back for him."

Jenny nods again, this time like she's preparing herself for battle, which she probably should in case Derek gets ahold of her.

She touches his shoulder and with a poof of black smoke, they're back in the cool tunnel system under the preserve. His head always spins after he tags along for a teleportation, but he pushes the dizziness away to focus.

"He's not here," she announces, which, _duh._

Stiles rushes to the chain of handcuffs, and gags when he sees the discarded piece of flesh left on the floor that must be Derek's. He must have pulled himself free. After all these years of supernatural gore, he still has issues with dismemberment.

"Could they have taken him?" Stiles asks, suddenly wishing very hard that the rest of the witches had found him before Jenny did, but she shakes her head and frowns.

"No. They wouldn't've ripped him from the cuffs, that's not… that's not how we do things. He must've escaped." She shakes her head again and turns to him, the moonlight casting through the holes in the wall so dim that he can barely make out her features, but he can see the slight smile gracing her lips. It seems almost nostalgic and she chuckles, melancholy. "It's so weird having to explain this to you. The Stiles I remember knew more about magic than our own Priestess, probably. We were good friends."

The sentiment is genuine, Stiles can tell. He doesn't know how but he can.

Before he has a chance to even put together a reply, he sees Derek bound through the archway, rage written across his face. His fangs have descended along with his claws and his eyes burn red.

"Get away from her, Stiles." His voice is low but still as menacing as it could ever be.

He launches at Jenny first, who's too startled to do anything but flinch, and Stiles, ever the realist that he is, jumps between them so he doesn't slaughter the best hope for information they have.

"Get out of the way," Derek snarls, snapping his teeth and flashing his eyes. It's an intimidating tactic that hasn't worked since sophomore year and it certainly doesn’t work now.

"No," he says firmly.

The Alpha grinds his teeth in a firmly set jaw and if looks could kill, Stiles would be six feet under right now.

He moves to push Stiles out of the way, but Stiles uses the momentum to spin around towards Jenny. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees the pendant--a gold-rimmed hourglass, the sand suspended between each orb and makes a hasty decision. Before he's manhandled out of the way he reaches for the pendant and thinks of Derek's house, the kitchen of all places, and suddenly it's as if all of the breath has been sucked from his lungs and his body floods with power.

They're in Derek's kitchen that instant, just like he'd envisioned, and the rush of magical power courses through his veins like heroin before he's left tired and woozy. He doesn't even notice when Derek rips the pendant from her chest and crushes it in his palm, the glass crackling as it shatters against his skin. He advances on her, claws out, eyes crimson, hand raised and ready to slash out her throat. She's left cowering backwards with no way out, now that her magical pendant has been crushed. Instead, her hands shape two white orbs, the same kind that was used as weapons that first night, ready to throw in his direction.

Stiles goes stomping between them, waving his arms wildly. "Stop!" he shouts and notices the sudden shock that rolls over Derek's expression.

"You can see?"

"Jenny fixed my eyes."

Derek's expression darkens at the mention of the witch and he glowers in her direction. "Why are you helping her?"

Stiles shrugs, standing his ground in the face of a wolfed out Alpha. Derek won't hurt him. He's pretty sure.

"The better question to be asking is, 'why is she helping us?' eh," Stiles jests weakly. Derek gives him a long-suffering look. "Okay, she helped us escape from that torture dungeon and this is the best chance we have at defeating the rest of the coven. She has information we need, Derek."

Derek relaxes, his claws turning back into nails as he begrudgingly considers Stiles' statement.

"Fine," he grinds out, much to Stiles' surprise, "but we tie her up. She's not going anywhere. I don't trust her."

"Fine," Stiles says easily. He's not sure he trusts her either.

Jenny is pushed into the corner, her wrists bound with an extension cord Derek finds under the kitchen sink, bound all the way up to her fingernails to keep her from casting. Her feet are bound as well, but she snarks about it up until Derek threatens her with his teeth.

"God, I hate blondes," Derek grumbles resentfully, kicking the coffee table in frustration.

Stiles' head whips to the sound of the front door opening, ready to bolt, but instead, Erica and Isaac come striding in. Erica's got a sharp grin on her face as her eyes cut to their captive.

"Aw, you don't mean that Der," she says, her eyes flashing gold as she trails her claws along the couch, circling Jenny like a hungry shark. "I think you just hate crazy bitches."

Isaac smiles as well, his eyes darkening when Jenny's breath shortens into something more erratic. Derek makes a noncommittal noise, seemingly content to let his betas terrorize the girl.

"How did you know to come?" Stiles asks.

"Pack bond. I could feel Derek in trouble," Erica answers, never taking her eyes off the blonde. "The rest of the pack should be here in a bit."

Isaac toys with Jenny's short hair intimidatingly, folding a lock between his fingers as she watches him warily.

She hasn’t taken her eyes off of the two betas since they walked in. Her eyes are careful, closed off, but not afraid; not like she had been fearful of Derek.

"Mind if we play with her for a bit before we kill her?" Isaac asks Derek, throwing a playful look over his shoulder, but Stiles knows he's all bark.

Derek rolls his eyes. He stands up and moves towards the witch, shooing his betas away. He grips the cord around her hands and yanks her forward, eyes burning with ire. Stiles watches them and finds himself content not to intervene as long as she doesn't get seriously hurt.

"Tell us," the Alpha orders, his voice low and threatening. "Why did you help us? What do you know about the coven?"

They'd found a lot on traditional witch covens, but that was precisely the problem. They were drowning in information and didn't know what to look for, left with nothing useful.

"I don't believe Stiles is responsible. I don't think he… I don't think he did it. I can't let them murder him if he's innocent."

Derek gives the cord another yank. "Why?"

"Because Stiles, the Stiles I know would never kill anyone who didn't pose a threat to his pack. We were close. Really close."

"What does _that_ mean?" Stiles asks, one eyebrow lifted in her direction.

Yeah, she was pretty, but in a girl-next-door sort of way that definitely didn't match his type. His type being tall, dark, and broody apparently.

She looks quickly between Derek and Stiles before her eyes widen and bounce around the room nervously. "No, no, not like that. We were good friends, you tutored me in magic. I had a lover." Her eyes cast down, a darkness overtaking them. "She's dead."

"Fine," Derek barks out, "you don't believe Stiles did it. We don't either, and frankly, even if he did, I'd kill all of you before you could lay a hand on him."

His threat is so unwavering that it shocks Stiles, even more so than the way that all three of the others in the room don't even blink at the protectiveness in his tone.

Stiles clears his throat and her clear blue eyes focus on him.

"If you think I'm innocent, then who did it?"

She looks away then, mouth opening and closing as she contemplates her next reply. Her eyebrows draw down together in confliction. Derek yanks her so hard she falls to her knees and grabs her by the chin so she has nowhere to look but at his face.

"They'll slaughter me," she says, chin tilting up, unwavering.

"You know what I'm gonna' do if you don't tell us? If you try to lie to us?" Derek's jaw ticks while he waits for a reply. Jenny shakes her head slowly, a visible shiver wracking her body as her eyes widen into little saucers. A terrifying maniacal grin takes over Derek's face. "First, I'll throw you across the room, like you're a ragdoll, and the force of your feeble little body hitting the wall will break at least fifteen of your bones. Then I'm going to break the other 191 bones in your body,"-- and _woah_ , Derek knows off the top of his head how many bones are in the human body? _Hot_ \--"and watch you squirm under my bare hands as I break them one by one. Then I'm going to string up your entrails like Christmas lights, reach down your throat and rip your spine out. My betas will be allowed to express their creative integrity with whatever's left of your body."

"Creative sculpting was the only class I ever got a perfect 100 in," Erica ponders, picking at the dirt under her nails. "I was especially good with a modelling knife."

"Still sound worse than betraying your Priestess?"

Jenny shakes her head, chest rising and falling fast. She does a poor job at hiding panic.

_Damn, Derek_. This whole intimidation thing Derek has going on is super hot when it's not directed at Stiles, or, maybe especially when it's directed at Stiles. Thinking back to the whole slamming-Stiles-up-against-walls-thing, he can totally see getting off on a fast dirty fuck while Derek holds him up against the wall--by his throat. _Ungh._

He should really stop thinking about wall sex while half the pack is in the room or they'll smell his pre-boner, as he likes to call them, and yep okay Derek is glaring at him. He can smell it.

"Seriously, Stiles? Now?"

And just when Stiles thought he didn't have any more dignity left to lose. "What? I can't help it!"

Derek growls, a human growl, in the back of his throat and turns back to Jenny with his eyes rolling so hard Stiles thinks it probably hurts. Somehow he looks angrier like this than when he's threatening to make someone _literally_ spineless.

He can hear Isaac and Erica snickering to themselves, but he doesn't dare look at them.

"Tell us," Stiles says quietly, "maybe we can fix this."

Jenny sinks down dejectedly and sighs. "We meet a couple years from now and you agree to tutor me in magic. Once, when you were tutoring me, you said something about Alphas sometimes killing their betas to absorb their power. Celine, our high priestess, she's the only one who saw Stiles attack the coven. Rowan, Shannon, and I were outside when it happened." She stops, shuffles in place and gives Stiles a pointed look. "I found something in one of our grimoires, about High Priestesses; about how they're similar in how they can obtain power. They can kill their coven to become a more powerful witch. Steal the magic in their soul."

Stiles sucks in his lips and nods. "So she's trying to frame me. Okay, but why the sudden change of heart? How do I know we can trust you?"

"While we prepared the spell that would take us here, to you, Celine was very secretive. Every time I asked her about our over-all plan she just said, 'Don't worry about it. Bring him to me and I'll take care of it.' We've captured you twice now and each time she knows we have you, she calls us all to meet with her. But without you."

"That explains why she hasn't just killed you yet. If the Priestess gets to Stiles and the rest of your coven isn't resurrected, you'll know she was lying," Derek deduces.

"And if she's able to kill the rest of her coven, she'll have the power to kill Stiles and steal his spark. She's waiting for the right time to attack all of you."

Erica speaks up, eyes glued to the red manicured nails she's picking at. "So tell us where they're hiding and we can take them by surprise."

"Celine has probably noticed I'm missing by now and she'll assume I've given them up. Rowan informed her that I've been questioning using magic to kill an ally. I'm a healer, not a killer. They've probably moved bases, and even if they were still hiding out there, it's warded up the ass--you'd be sensed a mile away."

Something in Jenny's statement ticks Derek off. The werewolf stands up abruptly and storms out of the room, but before he's out of sight he points at the witch and growls, "Keep her tied up until we have a solid plan," and slams the door to his room behind him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am WAY too exhausted to final edit, so I'm just kinda throwing this shit at you semi-raw. At least it's up on time. ENJOY!  
> And yes, in case you were wonder (I know you weren't it's fine), each Chapter is the name of a song. This one is by Leon Bridges. Go look it up, I'm obsessed with it. Or don't. It's cool you-do-you pal
> 
> THANKS FOR READING
> 
> PS: I live in a three hundred year old house in New England and Yes the layout is hell


	3. Awake

Long black tipped fingers trail impatiently along the bark of a tree; a physical attribute that came along with the slaughtering of her coven. Celine's fingers twitch constantly now with the extra power of her dead witch sisters, the magical residue sizzling in her skin. Rowan and Shannon, the two remaining witches, have willfully looked the other way about her recent physical changes but the other girl, she's not so sure.

"Where is Jenny?" The Priestess asks, measuring Rowan with a look of impatience. "Don't you think her disappearance after Stiles and Derek's is a bit shady?" She looks to Shannon, who's significantly shaky, unlike Rowan who just looks angry.

"We'll find her," promises Rowan, vehemently.

Celine feels the magic brew hot under her skin, ripping her cells apart, eating away at her soul, consuming her physical form. She turns away from them to hide the ripple she feels turning a patch of skin on her neck a sickly color, but she doesn't care, too consumed in the intoxicating feel of power. "How? Where might you find a witch of her knowledge? No doubt she's veiled herself from scrying spells."

"If she rescued Stiles, then she's probably with him. We should go to the Hale house and finish this already."

"No!"

She hears Rowan falter from behind her, and then, "Celine, are you hiding something from us? Whatever it is, I'm sure…"

The question is asked timidly, and when the words are uttered Shannon inhales sharply, but Celine is only incensed further. The anger bubbles up inside her like boiling hot tar and her cheeks sink in. It seems as if her patience has run out.

Rowan stares on while Shannon turns her head to look away, blindly grabbing for friend's hand to cling to it. The redhead had always found a sense of belonging in the coven under Celine, but her loyalty had made her blind to the horrors under the layer of lies her Priestess had fed them. Shannon, while timid, had mastered the ability to perfect enchantments; she's the only reason they were able to perfect the hourglass charms they wear around their necks for time travel and teleportation. Jen had always been the trouble maker, looking in places she wasn't allowed, arguing with Celine over the old ways.

As Celine's skin bubbles and hardens into horrifying grayish welts on her shoulders and arms, Rowan is beginning to suspect Jenny was right. Celine had something to do with the mass slaughter of their coven.

The Priestess turns sharply, revealing the pulsing blackness that's begun to curl up her skin in winding rivulets, her eyes glowing a fierce gray like the sky on the verge of a thunderstorm. Rowan and Shannon's reactions, fearful and epiphanic, are what triggers Celine to move on them. She has no use for them without their unyielding loyalty.

With a quick flex of her fist, Celine shatters their amulets as they hang around the witches' necks, leaving them stranded in the woods. So Rowan and Shannon do the only thing they can think to: run.

Shannon tightens her grip on Rowan's hand and they turn on their heels and dash away without another word. Two terrified dark shapes fruitlessly tearing through the woods to escape their fate.

It's over in seconds. Celine has no need to give chase, she simply flexes her fingers into fists and their throats constrict as if invisible hands gripped them in a chokehold. Rowan's hands glow white in a last ditch effort to defend herself and Shannon, her eyes going black in her fury, but soon the grip tightens impossible, crushing her throat, and they fade into that emptiness that signals death, like the light in her had been snuffed out. Shannon goes quickly after, struggling against the invisible grip crushing her trachea, Celine watching with cold indifference, slightly camouflaged by the darkness and thick foliage.

 

* * *

 

Witches? They're the worst. Supernatural Asshats, really.

They're the reason Derek's been trailing behind Stiles like an overprotective guard dog for the past six hours. And Derek? He's really nice to look at, don't get Stiles wrong, but he needs some goddamn alone time. The kind of alone time where he can think about said guard dog in very sinful ways, but he can't do that if Derek's got a leash on him.

Ha. He really never will run out of dog jokes.

"What are you laughing at?" Derek grunts.

Stiles looks up from where he'd been clicking away on the keyboard of his laptop. "Do you honestly care?"

Derek makes a considering face and says, "No."

"'Course you don't."

Derek's expression pinches and he snaps his paperback shut with a clap. "What is that supposed to mean?"

Not to mention, spending so much time with your unrequited crush is emotionally exhausting. And, holy shit, he's admitted it. He's crushing on Derek. _Hard_.

"Well, you do have a propensity for being a giant uncaring asshole." Stiles shrugs with a smug look of challenge.

Derek leans forward as if to stand but pauses thoughtfully and then sits back down, his jaw working before he's completely still. It's when he's leant against the back of the chair, his face is a suspiciously composed expression, that he finally looks at Stiles. He's… relaxed?

"You're right. I am a giant. Uncaring. Asshole."

Oh no.

"That's why I ran into the preserve in the middle of the night when Allison told me you'd put yourself in danger. _Again_."

Derek may seem calm, but it's the calm type of anger. A much more deadly type of anger, like when someone is brewing with so much rage they are physically incapable of expressing it. Stiles has seen Derek all different types of pissed off, but he hasn't witnessed this, and this is kind of terrifying.

"That's why I took you into my home when you needed round the clock protection."

Definitely terrifying.

"That's why I walked you around my house while you were blind, so you could become reacquainted with the layout; why I spent hours finding things for you to listen to, so you weren't bored; why I made sure to follow you both of the times a witch transported you somewhere else. And that's why I've spent all night tonight watching you like a hawk incase Jenny was lying or if her coven comes looking for you here. I do all of those things because I don't care about you."

Stiles swallows heavily, struck still by Derek's words. He tries to measure Derek's expression, but nothing radiates from it except placidity, a perfect poker face.  
He opens his mouth and closes it again before he finally rasps out a weak, "Derek…" But he's not even sure what he's going to say. Derek's never really said more than a few words at a time to Stiles unless it was a threat, so he's not quite sure how to approach this.

But he's interrupted by Derek shaking his head and getting up to leave the room. It takes him a sizable moment before he's even able to follow after him, only to find that he's nowhere to be seen. Everyone in the pack has fishily begun acting busy around the house with a random task, everyone with the exception of Erica, who's got her arms crossed over her busty chest and an arched eyebrow.

She's been spending way too much time around her Alpha, clearly.

"You're an oblivious idiot," is all she says like that's supposed to mean something to Stiles.

"At least Erica admits that she's a nosy werewolf, unlike the rest of you cowards," Stiles grumpily addresses everyone else in the room, pausing to give Scott a particularly suspicious look. "Where'd Derek go?"

When Erica nor the rest of the pack answers, he looks to Jenny, who's suddenly gagged silent by the look Erica gives her.

"C'mon seriously?" Stiles scoffs and suddenly the lights cut out and everyone freezes.

After a moment of tense silence, the doorbell rings, and no one moves to get it. Even Erica, who is usually delighted to torment whoever shows up at the door, stares apprehensively at it.

Stiles, ever the realist even in situations where a witch is tied up in the living room of a werewolf, rolls his eyes. He figures if whoever's at the door has the propriety to ring the doorbell instead of bursting in, they're probably not a villain.

He moves from the spot where he was standing. "Since none of you are being useful, I'll get it." Isaac appears from around a corner somewhere like the creep he is and stops Stiles with an outstretched arm. Stiles huffs. "What? The pitifully fragile human can't get the door now?"

Isaac levels him with a look Stiles can't quite make out in the darkness, but he's pretty sure it's extremely unimpressed. "No," the beta says, "I can't hear or smell anyone at the door. They've masked themselves."

Oh.

The Witches. Great.

"Hello, Hale Pack," a soft, dulcet voice greets through the darkness. A woman's voice, no doubt, seems to be projecting from all around. "You have something of mine."

The lights flicker on, but there's no woman to point to the strange spectral voice. However, when Stiles hears a sharp intake of breath, he turns to see a coiled up pile of extension cords where Jenny had been a moment ago.

Stiles tenses the same time Isaac springs to action. "I can't hear Derek's heartbeat anymore," he says over a breath of realization, and then stalks towards Derek's office down the hall. He swings the door open and comes back blanched, eyes wide, tracing the room of stunned people over.

" _That's where he was_?!" Stiles shouts, mostly at Erica.  
Boyd rolls his eyes, but he's just as unsettled by the sudden disappearance as the rest of the pack. His fangs and claws have elongated. "Stiles now isn't the time."

"Had you told me where he was, we wouldn't be in this mess!"

"Shut up, Stiles."

The pack ignores him, standing stock still in their places. Stiles and Allison watch the betas cock their heads back and forth, channelling into their advanced hearing. Eyes shooting back and forth between everyone in silent communication.

"Me shut up?! They were probably waiting for us to get separated! This isn't a coincidence! Jesus fucking Christ!"

Scott gives Stiles this look like he's the one that gets to be annoyed. He opens his mouth as if to add to the running commentary that Stiles should just shut his mouth, but then his jaw clicks shut and his eyes grow wide and--

A hand's spinning Stiles around by the shoulder and he's met by cruel glowing eyes and a brittle grin framed by long black hair.

"Hi Stiles," the woman chirps perkily. Behind her he sees Isaac taking quiet steps towards the two of them, but the monstrous woman seems to be two steps ahead of him.

He's swept up in a familiar whirlwind that tells him he's being teleported, and suddenly he's in that derelict old house Jenny had brought him to in the wake of rescuing him. His eyes search her chest for an hour glass amulet, but there is none, and suddenly Deaton's words about power hungry witches turning into monsters surface in his mind.

There's a half-empty bookshelf and a pile of books doing a crummy job of concealing a body. A thin body with short blond hair and way-too-gray skin that's lying in a puddle of her own blood. Jenny, Stiles concludes. But more importantly there's Derek, across the room, sprawled out on the floor trapped in a circle of mountain ash.

It's clear that the Alpha is a little drugged out; his eyelids are fluttering halfway shut, the ropes binding his wrists are so thickly laced with wolfsbane that purple powder dusts the floor underneath him. His flesh has been sliced open where the rope is tightly wound and spindly black tendrils dance up from where the wounds refuse to heal against the wolfsbane.

Stiles' stomach sinks at the sight of Derek's lips, that are almost the same color of his sickly pale skin. The wolf breathes something reminiscent of Stiles' name, making an attempt to move towards him, but winces and groans against the agony it causes him. He wouldn't have gotten far within a circle of mountain ash, anyways.

The only one who can move the ash is him or…

"Celine," Stiles says, like it's an accusation, glaring at the witch who's smirking at him in amusement.

She circles him like a buzzard, hums in acknowledgement.

"You want my spark, huh?" _Might as well just cut right to the chase._

She lets out a short, breath of a laugh. His eyes shift over to Derek's form and then back to her. "So, Jen did figure out my master plan after all," she says sardonically.

Underneath her blackening skin where boils have risen and the points between her bones have sunken in, Stiles can picture what she used to look like: beautiful. He hates her for that, but most of the beautiful women who come passing through Beacon Hills end up drunk on power and hellbent on killing him.

"Yeah. She did."

He sways forward, towards Derek, ideas of how to get close enough to break the circle of ash swarming through his head, but Celine stops him with a hand on his chest. She tsks at him, little bolts of electricity dancing around her blackened fingers.

"Come on," Stiles tries to coax, "I'm the spark. What are you going to do with a werewolf? It's me you want. Just let him go." Celine swoops closer, only amused at his attempts to bargain. Her free hand begins to move towards Derek and Stiles flails one arm out to knock it in the opposite direction, terrified of her throwing some sort of super-energy ball that could kill him in the state he's currently in. "No. Just. Okay." He takes in a deep breath and meets eyes with Derek. "Okay, yeah. Just take it. Take my spark, kill me, do whatever you have to do, but let Derek live and leave the rest of the pack alone."

He watches Derek shift in protest at this, struggling against his restraints with a new burst of energy. He's shaking his head, wincing through the pain flaring up from his wrists. "Stiles, no," he says weakly, through a pant.

Celine measures him with a long look of what he can only guess as pity and then shrugs.

She doesn't even grace him with an answer, just grabs his chin in an iron grip, forcing his mouth open, and sweeps forward with a deep inhale. And suddenly Stiles can feel himself withering away. He can feel his spark, his life force, draining away with every inhale she takes. Her bones snap and reform, shifting under her skin into something bigger, without a true shape. She's turning into something truly hideous, with rows of long jagged teeth and a bent spine, cheekbones so sharp they nearly pierce through her flesh.

The way he can see the glowing blue mist of his spark swirling from his mouth into hers, he thinks J.K. Rowling wasn't too far off with the Dementor thing.

And then Derek manages to pull himself up onto his hands and knees and knock himself against the boundary of ash. It shutters against his force, but it is far from enough to break the circle, however it does give Stiles a brilliant idea.

If his spark can extend mountain ash when he needs it, it can break a circle. He just has to _believe_ , as Deaton put it.

He just hopes there's enough left in him to work. He can barely keep his eyes open as it is.

Stiles tries anyways.

He closes his eyes and does his absolute best to focus on visualizing a break in the circle of ash, which is pretty hard considering the rabbiting of his heart in his ears. The image in his head is beginning to get foggy, though, and suddenly he can't hear anything except a growing ringing in his ears. Pressure starts to fill his head, the feeling strikingly like the time he got choked out by an Omega, like he's going to explode. He's pretty sure he's going to pass out.

Yep. He and Derek are going to die.

Except a moment later the fingers gripping his chin are gone and he can suddenly fucking _breathe_ , and when he opens his eyes he sees the whole circle of mountain ash has been smeared and Derek's already slashed open her throat. She drops to her knees first, her discolored blood running down her chest like a torrent, and then topples over onto her side as she bleeds out.

The two men stand there for a minute in their strangely anticlimactic victory just panting.

But nothing really is a true win for Stiles and the fact that he finds himself dropping to his knees shortly after Celine only attests to this. She drained too much of his life force.

Derek, for his part, pops his claws and tears at the ropes around his wrists until it's just too loosely hanging, pathetic pieces of twine. The wolfsbane is still in his system, but the cuts look less inflamed than before.

His face as lost even more color somehow as he kneels down next to Stiles, hands hovering around him like he wants to help, but has no idea how.

"Stiles, wake up. You have to stay awake." Derek says, but Stiles feels loopy and all he wants to do is sleep. Sleeping sounds super awesome right now actually. He's definitely gonna' close his eyes right now and pass out.

Or not. Because Derek deals Stiles a semi-hard slap to the face that wakes him right up.

"Stiles!"

"Wha--" Stiles groans, clutching at his throbbing head.

"You have to take your spark back from Celine while she's still alive. Her heart is still beating but it's slipping fast."

"No. Sleep."

Two hands grip the collar of his shirt and shake him hard enough for his head to bounce off the ground. "Get up you idiot or you'll die."

Dying doesn't sound as awesome as sleep does, but still. Sleep. He feels himself drifting farther into its cloying embrace.

"But I don' even know _how_ to take it back," Stiles slurs.

Derek rolls his jaw so hard the muscles pop out at the sides of his neck and he rolls his eyes back into his head. "Just do what she did. Breathe it in or what the fuck ever you have to do just do it!" He doesn't even wait for a response, just drags Stiles unceremoniously by his shirt over to Celine's incapacitated body. He flicks the back of Stiles' head just to shove him closer to the horrifying bust that has become of her and orders him to, "do it now."

Pfft, whoever said Derek wasn't polite?

But above all, Derek's right. He either does this or dies; he can feel the last remnants of his lifeforce flickering away, the feeling a mixture of someone tearing a giant hole in his heart and the way his muscles scream the day after a long, arduous workout. He thinks he'd cry if he had the energy.

With a weak finger, Stiles tilts Celine's chin up, gently pulls it down to open her mouth and inhales, picturing that pretty blue fog transferring from her to him.

He feels it immediately and has to pull back and gasp. It's stings like freezing air scratching down his throat, but the rush that comes with it feels a bit how he imagines a cocaine high feels--a toe-curling adrenaline rush that makes your whole body jitter. It's not pleasant, but at least he doesn't feel like he's going to die in his sleep anymore. So he dives back in and takes whatever he can before Celine's heart gives its final thump.

When all is said and done and Stiles has taken away all the unnatural power that made Celine into the monster she'd become, she looked like just a normal girl. Well, a normal dead girl, but he can see how beautiful she was before she went psycho. Her long black hair is healthy and shiny in its set of thick loose curls, her big ocean-blue eyes, full lips and button nose. She looks younger like this, without the overflow of ill-gotten magic tainting her physique, but it doesn't matter now that she's dead.

It's not until Derek lets out a fatigued howl to signal the rest of the pack where they are that they realize maybe Stiles took a little too much magic-y life force stuff.

It starts small, the feeling of energy thrumming under his skin all over his body. It's even refreshing at first, but then what seems like a pleasant buzz quickly turns into an icy-hot chill, like he'd jumped head first into ice water. The feeling strikes him harshly, and he pants, trying to tamp down the anxiety attack peaking its ugly head around the corner.

Derek must hear the violent thrumming of his heart because he turns and frowns at him. "Stiles, are you okay?"

He opens his mouth to tell him, _no. I am not fucking okay. thank you very much_. But his throat doesn't so much close up as it does freeze under the zap of the electrical current.

Jesus, if he thought he could feel it everywhere before, he was so wrong. He can feel the magic consuming him, sinking through layer by layer of skin to his muscles, then his bones and his organs. Even his eyes tingle like they'd somehow fallen asleep like a limb would. He feels it until every single cell in his body is vibrating.

"Stiles?"

He's 100% sure he's not a real person anymore. He can't be made of flesh and all those other red soft things that are hidden inside him. He is only a walking bolt of lightning. He's not real. _Fuck, he's not real._

"Hey!" Derek's waving in his face. "Yes, you are. You're right here."

Stiles wants to scream that he's not, but all he can manage (and it's honestly a miracle he was able to manage any words at all) is a simple, "Please touch me."

Derek does as he's told without question, wrapping his arms around Stiles' shoulders and tugging him against his warm solid chest. And just before Stiles blacks out, he idly wonders if this is what burning alive feels like.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey! I'm literally 10 minutes late to work AT THIS EXACT MOMENT so I had NO time for last-minute editing. I will go back and do it. AnyWAysS HERES THIS CHAPTER
> 
> Song is Awake by Electric Guest. ENJOY
> 
> Revise: Finished final editing. (:


	4. I Want a Little Sugar In My Bowl

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here it is guys, last chapter of the first fic I've ever finished and published. Soak it in, guys. Literally, like 5k words of porn, because let's be honest, that's what you guys really came here for.

Stiles wakes up on a very badly cushioned surgery table with a very irritating white light shining on his face. His immediate thought: turn it the fuck _off_ so he can go sink back into that weird dream where werewolves existed and he had magical powers and Lydia screamed at dead people. Or when people even _died_. Whatever.

His second thought is: Woah, _did I just turn that light off with my mind?_

"He's awake," someone announces. The light clicks back on, but it's quickly maneuvered out of Stiles' eyes and _holy shit he did turn it off with his mind! Sweet!_

But also, he's awake.

So, boo.

He sits up, hands steadying himself on the edge of the operating table and glares at every single person and mythical creature in the room. Why does he always end up in Deaton's veterinary clinic when he's injured or out cold? Why can't they take him back to his own apartment for once? Or at least get a comfier couch or chaise to lay him down on instead of this piece of sheet metal with a blanket thrown over it.

"Congratulations on likely being the most powerful spark in the world as of early yesterday morning," Deaton announces, just because he's a vague asshole.

He blinks and turns sharply to look out the tiny windows lining the far wall of the room. The sun is at least midway up in the sky. "How long was I out for?"

"About thirty three hours." Stiles gapes. "You took a pretty strong hit of magic. Amazingly, it didn't kill you, but you will have to start training immediately otherwise it will. And it will probably kill many, many people around you if you don't learn to control it first."

"Non-negotiable, Stiles," he hears his dad decree.

"Got it, dad," he answers, focusing more on turning the light on and off at will which should be disturbing, but only ends up being entertaining and surprisingly easy. "M' just glad it's all over."

"It's not over," Derek growls. The eye roll from Erica is almost funny, but Derek keeps leveling him with this ridiculous glare that sucks all of the humor out of the room. "We still have to warn the coven when we meet them--whenever that happens--about Celine."

Lydia frowns. "That would alter our timeline."

Stiles looks around the room and _really_ takes in how many people are standing around in the tiny area: Deaton, his dad, and the entire pack save for Allison and Isaac. Too many people, not enough space; yet another reason why they need to stop bringing him, a human, to a damned animal clinic.

"Oh, oh! I know this one," Stiles interrupts, just as Deaton opens his mouth to explain. He sits up hastily, and nearly falls right off the table as his vision clouds up, likely from low blood sugar.  "The witches already did too much damage to our timeline for it to be the same ones they came from. We know too much about the future, so logically, it can't possibly be _our_ future." Everyone gawks at him. "What? I've seen Back to the Future. It's a pretty agreed upon theory."

Deaton frowns at him, either in annoyance or surprised admiration. "Well… Stiles is right from what I know, on an extremely basic level, but I would still advise warning the coven when they cross your paths before letting things go too far. It's a bit paradoxical, but you may end up saving other versions of you in different timelines."

Deaton goes on a tangent about time travel and paradoxes and dimensions and all of his theories about those things, and Stiles zones out, trying to find that thrumming of magic under his skin, but he feels perfectly normal. Just like before. Only now he can turn things on and off with a single thought and, wow, apparently make his skin emit a warm glow when he thinks about Derek. But all in all, he's okay, which means his dad goes back to being the sheriff, Erica and Boyd slink off to go do nefarious things to each other, and Lydia announces she has better things to do than contribute to the pack's maudlin that Stiles is safe and okay, and soon it's just Stiles and Derek, with Deaton attending to the actual animals in the backroom.

"So, you gonna' give me a ride back to my apartment?" Stiles asks, kicking a stray piece of asphalt on the way to Derek's Camaro.

Derek grunts, still looking fresh out of hell with all the fury tacked onto his face. He refuses to look at Stiles as he slips into the driver's seat. "You left some stuff at my place. You'll pick that up first."

"Okay," Stiles says weakly, sinking into the buttery soft leather of the passenger seat. So Derek's super-ultra-mega pissed at him. What else is new?

The car ride is filled with pregnant silence. Stiles knows just from the look on Derek's face that more is going to be happening than Stiles grabbing his things and heading home, especially when Derek slams his Camaro into park and nearly drags Stiles up the driveway and porch steps into the entryway. Derek's grip is firm but Stiles is still able to wrench himself free just before they make it to the hallway.

Half expecting Derek to turn around and shove him into the wall and spit in his face, Stiles squares his shoulders and prepares to kick and wriggle his way out. Instead, the man just turns on him, flexing his jaw like he's ready to use violence, but his eyes look defeated and he slumps. Stiles is completely taken aback by it.

When Derek just stands there looking like he's about ready to give up, refusing to fully look at Stiles, Stiles loses his patience.

"If you have something to say, _say it,_ " Stiles dares, voice low and acidic, "because I'm getting real sick and tired this cold shoulder shit where you just manhandle me into submission."

Derek just sniffs in defiance, jaw clicking shut and eyes tacking onto something off to the side.

Stiles has to physically fight to resist throwing his head back and laughing in actual rage because that is such a _Derek Hale_ thing to do and he has no fucking idea why he's so head over heels for this asshole. Especially since he's never going to be loved back; not if he's always doing something to cause Derek to act like _this._

"You know what? Fine. I'll just grab my shit and leave since you're so adverse to communicating with me. Scott'll give me a ride."

Stiles makes to push past the alpha, but Derek pulls him back again by the elbow.

"If I thought I could get away with kicking you out of my pack, I would," is what Derek says, mercilessly, "but my betas would probably plan a mutiny against me."

The words hurt so much more than they should be allowed to, each one another spike hammered into his heart. Derek wants him _out._ But what Alpha wouldn't if they had a member they constantly had to babysit?

Stiles closes his eyes and swallows, expecting to feel the sting of tears rushing in, but instead, he just feels angry.

"It's not like that, Stiles," he hears Derek add, feeling Derek's other hand rest on his arm. "You have to stop throwing yourself in the way of danger for the rest of us. We're werewolves--we can take care of ourselves."

Stiles pulls himself free again, the task much more difficult to accomplish than last time despite the grip feeling gentler. He takes a step back into the living room, almost tripping over a chair, but he doesn’t much care about that anymore. He's well past embarrassment. He just needs to get away from this. He just wants to curl up alone in his apartment under every blanket he owns.

He desperately tries to ignore how Derek's expression shifts to something he can't quite place. He feels even _more_ vulnerable under this gaze.

"Stiles-"

"Everyone thinks I'm so incapable!" Stiles finds himself yelling, feet threatening to just make a break for it as they take another step back of their own volition.

"You're not understanding me."

Stiles ignores him.

"I'm not fifteen anymore. I'm not just some useless and breakable human! Why don't you trust me? All I ever do is prove you wrong and you still don't!"

Derek's eyes flicker down to Stiles' feet, already poised to start running, and he takes a few tentative steps closer, eyes pleading.

"I _do_ trust you, Stiles, with my life, but I don't trust you with yours," Derek urges, taking another, surer, step forward, "and that's more important to me than anything. If you don't want to be around me, fine, but you're not allowed to die to accomplish that."

He falters, his whole body practically catching itself between one movement and the next, and turns to face Derek completely.

"I'm more important to you than your betas?" It's meant to be said in a statement, but the question hangs in the air between them anyways.

Derek doesn't answer, just looks away guiltily.

"You're lying."

"You and I both know, if you were a werewolf, you'd know that I wasn't."

It's a moment of decision for Stiles.

He looks towards the front door, knowing if he made a break for it right now Derek would probably let him, and then he looks towards Derek, whose expression has shifted into something terrified and vulnerable. A look Stiles has only seen on his face once or twice before; typically when something awful is about to happen to… him…

Stiles glances towards the exit again.

He _should_ be hammering in the last of the nails in this coffin because these unobtainable crushes only ever end in heartbreak for him, but he loves like a forest fire, fast and all-consuming. He should've known there was no stopping this from the first moment he laid eyes on Derek.

His heart briefly flutters with hope as he asks, "Do you like me?" Derek takes in a breath to answer, but then Stiles is off rambling. To be honest, he doesn't really want to hear the answer. "Because you're sending me very mixed signals here and I kinda feel like you like me, but you haven't said anything and for the longest time I thought you wanted to literally murder me but the only reason you haven't is because my dad is the sheriff and-"

"Stiles."

"And, _God,_ that sounds so middle school, sorry, we're both grown men now, but it sort of feels like that's what you're trying to say. But you _also_ just said you wanted me out of the pack and at first I thought it was because I was a burden but you said you cared about me, well, in so many words and now you're saying-"

" _Stiles!"_

He sucks in a breath--one he only realizes until now that he desperately needed--and steels himself. "What?"

"If I tell you that I like you, will you shut up?"

Before he even has the chance to register what Derek has just said, he blurts out, "Probably not."

"Of course not," Derek grumbles, swiping a hand down his face, and his tone is… dare he say it… _fond?_

He's pretty sure it was fond.

"Do you… like me, I mean?"

Derek takes a long pause, glancing at the front door himself as if _he's_ about to make his escape, which, Stiles secretly finds hilarious. Who does Derek think he is being afraid of Stiles?

"Yeah," Derek admits between two deep breaths, finally meeting Stiles' deep brown eyes like he's looking at the night sky for the first time. "I'm in love with you, Stiles. I have been for a long time."

"Woah."

He can hear a soft string of laughter on the end of a breath.

"Yeah."

Derek rolls his eyes, looking a little too uncomfortable for the moment for someone who just admitted they loved someone to the person who most definitely loves them back. And, oh yeah, out of all the times Stiles chooses to be silent it's when he _should_ be saying something like, "I love you too."

The smallest, shyest, most adorable little grin graces Derek's lips and Stiles would swear on his life that he felt his heart stop and restart at the sight of it.

"Really?"

"Yeah," he answers, because _duh_ , all fidgety and nervous like this is the first time he's ever been in love with someone, and well, maybe it is. Maybe Lydia was just a crush or a confused foreboding respect, but it never felt this good and true. Pure.

But on a more important note: how did Derek have no idea? The expert on chemo-signals and lie detection had no idea that this fumbling idiot was falling in love with him? Stiles doesn't buy that shit, but he knows better than to look a gift horse in the mouth. "But I only just figured it out a couple days ago so gimme' some le-way please. And just so you know, I have _a lot_ of questions about you being in love with me and all. Like how did you not know that-"

But then suddenly there's two hands framing his face and pulling him forward until there's lips against his. His heart practically skips ten beats at once.

He's too shocked to reciprocate for a good solid second, eyes frozen wide open on a face that's too close to make out the details of, and then it all comes crashing into him. He can't help but melt into the warmth of Derek.

Eyes fluttering closed, he focuses on the lips moving slowly against his, soft and sweeter than he could have imagined a kiss from Derek being. He parts his lips and falls into the rhythm, Derek cupping his cheeks.

When Derek pulls away, he almost falls forward against him, feeling intoxicated.

"Ask me later," Derek promises, with a grin so wide his eyes crinkle.

Oh right, Stiles has questions. Those don't seem to matter much right now.

"So much for le-way," he mumbles. The dopey smile he gives in return gets him pushed up against the back of the couch and he really can't tell if it's a punishment or reward for his snark.

Eh, he'll ask Derek later. He's got more important matters to attend to.

It's only a few breaths later that their mouths are amorously reattached and Derek is kissing down his neck and everything is _great._

"I'm still pissed at you," Derek rumbles against his Adam's apple. He doesn't sound pissed, he sounds hungry, and the way his palms flatten out over his waste and slide down to Stiles' ass only confirms this. There's a delicious wet slide of tongue from the bend of his neck to behind his ear that makes Stiles shiver and gasp.

"Yeah?" Stiles asks, breathily. "Does that mean we can have angry sex?"

"We can have all kinds," Derek says as he pulls back. The cool air hitting the spots where Derek's mouth had just explored gives Stiles a much needed relief. He lets his eyes flutter shut and head fall backwards, his neck supporting the weight in a sharp arch. The hot pressure of Derek's body against his anchors him, keeping that pleasant buzz in his chest still whirring. "That is… if you want to?"

Stiles cranes his head back to see Derek blush all the way up to his ears, his bottom lip caught between his teeth as he watches Stiles with a look that spells both lust and hope. It's probably the cutest thing Stiles has ever seen.

"Oh, Stiles wants," Stiles says with a cheeky grin. It earns him a slap on the ass. "Stiles wants _right now._ "

"If you keep referring to yourself in third person, _Stiles_ isn't going to get anything." Contrarily, Derek lifts him up from where's he's braced against the back of the couch and carries him down the hall to his bedroom with a pair of long, lean legs wrapped around his waist.

Stiles is dumped on the bed hastily and laughs as he bounces on the mattress before crawling up the mattress backwards, coming to rest on his elbows. His heart is racing so fast he can feel it from his head to his toes and the heat blooming in his belly spreads up through his chest and over his face; he can feel the blood pooling in his cheeks and in his cock so quickly it's making him dizzy. It's like Derek lit a wildfire inside of him.

Derek strips himself of his shirt while he stands at the foot of the bed and all the oxygen leaves Stiles' lungs.

Holy shit, _he's gonna' fuck Derek._ ** _Derek Hale._**

And just to piss him off, because annoying Derek is his new favorite thing (totally not new), he says, "Despite threatening Stiles with the withholding of sex, Derek proceeds to get nakey."

He hears choked off laughter from Derek while the fabric is still wrapped around his face and elbows. "Shut _up_ ," he says through a smile when the shirt is tossed to the floor. Stiles' eyes rake up and down that perfectly defined chest of his, over the lines of his pecks and abs all the way down to where his fingers have started to roughly undo his belt buckle.

Excited, Stiles rips his own shirt off, though not nearly as graceful as Derek had. He hits his forearm on the headboard and hisses, but not daring to take a moment to pause until he's out of his shirt and jeans. It's only then he pauses, and only to let his gaze lock on Derek's naked body. It's gorgeous, really. From the thick muscled thighs that twitch as he shifts his weight from foot to foot, his hard and heavy cock that is not too big but definitely not lacking, framed in thick dark hair that spreads from the space between his legs, over his stomach and chest, and just his general everything.

When Stiles finally looks up to Derek's face, he sees that Derek's looking him over lasciviously as well. Hell, there's practically drool running down his chin, and while Stiles feels giddy about the approval, he's uncomfortable under such heavy scrutiny. He's glad he left on his boxer briefs--for now.

"Oh, wow, look at you: surly _and_ sultry."

Derek snorts at the remark and literally _falls_ on top of Stiles, laughing when Stiles lets out a coughing "Oof!" and crawls up his body like some sexy cat sent from hell just to _ruin_ him. He breathes hot and moist over Stiles' face and takes his bottom lip between his teeth gently and tugs. It's a move that makes Stiles' underwear feel way too tight and uncomfortable, precome pooling between his slit and the fabric making it sting from the touch of cold air.

He gasps as Derek releases him with a smirk. "Clever," Derek deadpans, giving Stiles one last kiss before descending down his neck to lick at his collarbones. He doesn't spend too long in one place; it's as if he's a starving man who's been given a feast: he's got to taste everything that he can get his mouth on, as soon as possible.

"Oh, yeah. I'm real good at alliteration. Is that a turn on? I can do more."

Derek looks up at him through his eyelashes and Stiles sees for the first time that Derek isn't just smiling, he's smiling like he can't possibly do anything else, with his whole face; even his eyes are smiling, and it's something that makes Stiles want to cry with joy.

"Please don't."

"Aye, aye Capt- _aahhhh!_ " Stiles' back bows the moment Derek's teeth softly close around a nipple, lips puckering around it, and _sucks._ "Jesus fuck."

He feels more than hears one short breath of laughter that Derek releases. Teeth and tongue attack the patch of skin in a toe-curling array of sensations Derek gives him. When Stiles' back arches off the bed ever so slightly, he frees the nub with a look in his eyes that promises to explore that prospect more later, but what he's really interested in is still beneath a thin layer of fabric.

Derek rests his hirsute chin just where Stiles' ribs meet, assessing Stiles openly. The beautiful rainbow of his irises have been conquered by his expanding pupils. Fingers skating the edge of Stiles' waistband, he asks, "Is it alright if I...?"

"Yes," Stiles says breathily, heart beating out of his chest. "Anything you want, it's yours."

Derek sucks his bottom lip under his bunny teeth that in no way hides his bashfully excited smile. "Anything?"

"Yes! Yeah-yes. Consider this blanket permission. Just fucking-- _get to it._ " He's so hard it's beginning to get painful; the lack of blood flow to his brain making him dizzy in a tempest of lust and anticipation.

"Tell me to stop any time," is all Derek says before his underwear is finally, _finally,_ sliding off.

The cool air that brushes against his cock disappears as quickly as it comes. Derek's hot breath caresses it so perfectly Stiles can't help the involuntary thrust up off the bed, chasing the sensation.

Derek studies the flushed skin of his cock with intent, but not touching, just watching the pulse of it, the way it twitches when Stiles thinks Derek is finally going to put his mouth on it. Instead, when he swoops down he bites lovingly at the skin that connects his dick to his body. When he pulls back Stiles is openly panting and tense from head to toe, but he's not too calm and collected himself when he instructs Stiles to turn over onto his stomach.

Stiles is much too caught up in the whirlwind that is _derekderekderek_ to question the demand as he flops over. He can barely comprehend what comes next. The small, chaste, almost shy kiss placed on his lower back should really have helped lead him to this point though, because Derek has spread the cheeks of his ass and is just…

Well, Stiles doesn't know what he's doing.

Nothing. He's doing _nothing._

He lifts himself up on his elbows to look over his shoulder at Derek, who's lying between his spread legs just _staring_ at his asshole, which should be weird. It should feel way too intimate, but for some reason doesn't; it feels just as natural as their kissing had, which should really say something about Stiles' capacity for weird social situations but it's probably just because it's him and Derek. _Together_.

"Is this okay?" Derek asks, shy again.

"You're not doing anything, which is definitely not okay."

Derek finally lifts his eyes, big and pleading and all too soft for someone whose supposed to be all fangs and claws. "I was going to eat you out. If that's okay?"

Stiles' stomach swoops so harshly that he collapses back onto the pillow. "Blanket permission," he reminds Derek, words smothered into the pillow.

Derek doesn't say another word.

Derek's thumbs press him open and Stiles' lungs empty of all of their air at the first hot, wet, touch of tongue and it feels so good he thinks he might just melt right into the sheets. It's hesitant and light, almost not there at all; in fact he can almost feel Derek's hot breath against him almost more than the slick muscle itself. He makes a small noise and finds himself pushing back against the sensation and then Derek releases his cheeks, sliding his hands down to grip at the inside of his knees and buries his face in Stiles' ass. His mouth drops open to release a long drawn out moan.

Stiles definitely isn't a virgin. He went to college. He's done, you know, _stuff._ Like all the stuff with all the genders but he's never been rimmed before, surprisingly, and the mixture of the immense pleasure and the fact that Derek of all people is eating him out to high heavens makes him choke out pathetic sobs.

Derek's mouthing at him like a man who's been given the most delicious treat in the world. He's definitely going to have beard burn in his bits. Totally worth it.

The sheets under his groin have dampened from the precome that's steadily flowing out of him. His toes curl, his fingers wind into the pillow under his head, and his panting grows heavier and faster. The line of his back is draws up and taught while Derek works his tongue over him. His hold is broken when Derek slips his tongue inside, just slightly, and Stiles collapses again. It's winding him up higher and higher with no peak in sight.

_Fuck,_ he really needs to come.

"When are you gonna' fuck me?" Stiles garbles into the pillow.

Derek pulls back and spits where his tongue had been ravenously eating him out and rubs the pad of his thumb over his center. "Whenever you want," he replies midway through a groan. He's panting too, sounding as affected as Stiles does, which is frankly incredible because Stiles hasn't even touched his dick yet.

The tip of Derek's finger slowly pushes inside, pulling a quiet whimper out of him. The stretch is almost unnoticeable, but the feel is enough to have him salivating. He wants Derek inside him, like, a week ago.

"Now," he pants. "Now would be great."

Much to his distress the finger disappears, but just as soon as he's about to voice his complaints, the heavy heat of Derek's naked expanse presses him down into the bed. Stiles can feel the hard line of Derek's cock searing into his lower back and he wriggles underneath the man, gasping Derek's name and pressing back into it. He barely notices the sound of the bedside drawer being open and shut and the feeling of Derek's arm stretching over him.

"Lube," Derek whispers his explanation, breath warm and spine-tingling against his neck.

See, Stiles is pretty sure he meant to say, "Right," but what actually came out was "R- _ungh-fu-yeah._ " It's one of his more prideful moments.

Derek slides down his body again, hands caressing every valley of skin they can find on their way back down to Stiles' ass. One hand glides over the curve of one cheek and gropes it playfully, while the other massages his thigh.

"I can't believe I finally get to do this," Derek confesses roughly, so close to Stiles' ear that his whispered confession sounds almost loud beneath the pulse pounding in his ears. "I finally get to touch you like this. Tell you how much I love you, how beautiful you are. I've been waiting so long."

Just as Derek starts pressing a finger back in, after having been lubed up, Stiles freezes and squeaks out a muffled, "Stop."

Derek halts immediately, pulling his hands back like a scolded puppy. "Are you okay?" he asks, voice small.

"Yeah, I'm fine," Stiles says before scrambling to roll over onto his back underneath Derek and finally face him. "I just… when I went blind, it made me realize how much I really loved looking at you because I couldn’t anymore. I wanna' see you."

"Oh." The most radiant smile curves Derek's lips, opening up into a full-blown grin. Stiles feels his heart swell up in his chest, so grateful that he not only got to see it but was the cause of it. "Okay."

On the intake of a breath, Derek reinserts his finger. It slides in easily with the added lube, so much so that Derek slips in a second digit without hesitation. The sudden sensation of fullness sends him into a jerking motion upwards, gasping at the little mischievous smile Derek gives him.

Derek is so captivating like this. Well, he's always captivating, but just looking at him is pushing Stiles into a frenzy. His olive toned skin has already built up a steady sheen of sweat leaving his skin almost glistening, every muscle of his is on display taking turns flexing and relaxing as he opens Stiles up, and his face, _oh Jesus,_ his face. Derek looks so relaxed, nay, happy. Derek looks _happy._ His pupils are blown out but not quite enough to hide the dazzling array of colors in his eyes, his little bunny teeth poking out whenever he smiles gently or sucks in a lustful breath, the sweat from his hairline dripping down into his beard. Stiles is just about ready to pop off just watching him.

Stiles reaches down to grip the base of his cock, holding on tight to the sheets with the other hand and closes his eyes.

"Tell me," he croaks, "how much you love me. You said-" he breaks off into a pained moan when Derek twists his fingers just so and hits that perfect spot inside of him that lights him up everywhere. Like, literally lights him up. His skin has begun to emit that low glow that he discovered in Deaton's office when he thinks warm and fuzzy things about Derek. If Derek notices, he doesn't say anything about it.

With a gentle but firm grip, Derek removes Stiles' hand from his cock and moves to hover over Stiles in between his legs, placing the hand above his head next to the other. With his fingers still driving into him, he presses down until their cocks are lined up, as well as their mouths, taking Stiles into a messy kiss that's slow and dirty with a whole lot of tongue. His hips begin to undulate, causing their dicks to press together and grind into one another, wet and sticky.

"I'd do anything for you," Derek whispers against his open, panting mouth. A third finger presses in. "I decided, a long time ago, that even if you didn't love me back, that you were it for me. You’re it, Stiles."

Stiles' head bends back, neck arching just enough for Derek to swoop down and lick a stripe from his collarbone to his jawline. He's so close, he can barely breathe, barely listen to the breathy words Derek is confessing.

" _Fuck,_ " he rasps.

"You drive me completely insane, but I love it. I love it so fucking much. I love everything about you." Derek's tongue is a springboard for every syllable, dipping down to caress some of Stiles' skin between every few words. Stiles is left speechless, knees bending, balls drawing up, breaths coming in short bursts of ecstasy as Derek thrusts against him in time with his fingers. "You're my world."

Derek picks up the pace after he says this, biting just hard enough with blunt human teeth to burn in the most perfect way. Stiles doesn't stand a chance. He spasms, sobbing out a broken string of moans as he comes against both of their stomachs. Derek keeps him safe and wrapped up in the warmth of his body until Stiles' breaths even out, coming down from his orgasm, but only until then. He's quick to sit up onto his knees and lube up his own cock, still flushed a deep red, achingly hard. Stiles is content to just lay there smiling dreamily, spread out and catch his breath, relaxed, staring at the ceiling, wondering how the fuck he got so lucky.

"Are you ready?"

"Fuck yeah," Stiles says with a blinding smile in his post-orgasmic bliss. "Stick it in, Derek."

"Stick it in?"

"Stick it in."

Derek drops his head in defeat, sighing. "Were you born with your foot in your mouth?"

"No, but I wish I was born with your dick in my ass. Come on, I'm getting old."

Derek grumbles something under his breath that sounds suspiciously like a _gross._ Stiles snorts.

"Fine," is what Derek chooses to reply with before immediately pressing the head of his cock right where Stiles wants it most. The head pops in easily, but the stretch is enough to make him hold his breath. When Derek presses in further, all of Stiles' sarcastic wit flies out of him on an exhale of bliss.

Derek's eyes have bled alpha red. He holds himself stock still when he's seated all the way inside like he's fighting for control. Meanwhile, Stiles is left drooling and panting, two seconds away from just fucking himself onto Derek's cock.

Thankfully, Derek doesn't hold back for long. He starts with slow, gentle thrusts, holding one of Stiles' legs vertical so the back of his knee is pressed to his shoulder. Stiles has gone soft from his earlier orgasm and lets himself relax into the pleasure of Derek filling him up, loose-limbed, but quickly hardening again.

Derek seems to have a lot less control than Stiles does this round. His eyelids are heavy over burning red eyes as they're focused intently on Stiles' face, mouth hung open in uneven breaths, lips pressed messily to Stiles' knee. It's definitely the hottest thing Stiles has ever seen and pretty soon his cock is hard, the tip drooling into his bellybutton.

The heat sliding in and out is soon not enough to satiate him, so he ends up squirming underneath Derek in an attempt to match his pace. Rocking together, struggling for breath, Stiles manages to sob out, "Harder."

Derek obeys, slamming in on a hard thrust that has Stiles shuddering and arching on a long wanton moan, gripping the pillows in white knuckles.

" _Yes,_ " he hisses, eyes fluttering closed.

Derek does it again and the layer of sweat built of between them makes him slip. He lets go of Stiles' leg and collapses on top of him without even breaking his rhythm, licking Stiles' mouth open in a messy, searing wet kiss that gives Stiles' lips pins and needles.

He was sure life couldn't get any better a second ago, but now Derek's entire body is against his, driving into him, Derek's hands and mouth all over his skin, driving him insane, giving him goosebumps. The new angle allows Derek to reach his prostate with ease, hitting it on every single thrust. He's lightheaded he's so high on pleasure.

Derek groans and pulls away from kissing Stiles. One of his hands that was running up and down Stiles' side slides in between them and takes a firm grip of Stiles' cock.

"I'm close," Derek grunts between a few agitated breaths, wet abused lips sliding against each other. He doesn't give Stiles any time to reply as he begins stripping Stiles' cock with the same speed as his thrusts. Stiles wraps his arms around Derek's shoulders and grips the short hair at the base of Derek's neck.  
Derek himself is barely hanging on by a thread, Stiles can tell by the way Derek isn't present anymore. He's less focused on taking Stiles apart, lost in taking his own pleasure.

Fuck, Derek's gorgeous.

Stiles bites affectionately at his lower lip to tell him so since he can't really use his voice for anything productive at the moment.

Only a few more thrusts and Stiles is spilling his orgasm between them again, struck silent by the intensity of his second orgasm. His vision whites out, he shakes with it. If he wasn't so out of touch with reality in that moment, he would have felt Derek tense above him, coming at the feel of Stiles clenching around him.

When Stiles comes back to reality, Derek is still seated inside of him, already going soft, leaving gentle kisses up and down Stiles' neck and shoulder. He makes a sleepy noise and works his way up to Stiles' lips and gives him a slow kiss.

"You okay?" Derek asks, pulling away to rest their foreheads together.

" _Sooo_ much better than okay."

"Good," He says with a satiated smile that falls after a quick peck. "I'm sorry I've been such an ass."

Stiles hums. "I may also possibly be guilty of being an ass maybe."

"Maybe." He dips in to steal another kiss like he can't help it, and if Derek can't stop kissing Stiles, there's not a chance in the world he's going to complain. "We can talk about it later."

"Yeah, I still have a ton of questions by the way."

Derek groans, flopping down and hiding his face in the crook of Stiles' shoulder, but he can hear the fondness behind Derek's voice; it makes him smile.

"Nuh-uh, you’re not getting off that easily. There is no way you had no idea I was head over heels for you--you must've smelled it a mile away. We could have been doing this for _years._ You're in trouble."

"I couldn't tell if it was just sexual attraction or not."

"It's not."

Derek smiles against his shoulder and snuggles closer, snuffling at the skin behind his ear. "I know. Now."

"Does this make us boyfriends?"

Derek nods. "I'd like that."

Stiles shifts, grimacing at the feeling of drying come on his stomach and the ooze between his legs since Derek accidentally slipped out.

"We need to clean up."

Derek nods again, sleepily, wrapping himself around Stiles somewhat like an octopus. Stiles shakes his head, rolling his eyes with a smile.

"We also need to liquidate all your funds and buy two million pounds of curly fries," Stiles says for his own enjoyment, snickering when Derek hums agreeably, essentially dead to the world.

He closes his eyes and relaxes, wriggling deeper into Derek's embrace. He can deal with being nasty when they wake up, but for now, he's content to fall asleep in Derek's arms, ready for this new chapter in his life to begin.

 

\--- Epilogue ---

 

"Oh, nice. _Real_ nice. Spent the first eighteen years of my life trapped in a closet and now I'm back in one."

It's not nice. Stiles likes being trapped in claustrophobic spaces as much as the next guy, which is like, not at all, but he's willing to be facetious about it just to hear the long-suffering sigh Derek lets out behind him. "But at least we're in the closet _together._ We should get beards. Not the face ones, but you know, like those girls that pretend-"

"Stiles. Shut up."

_There it is,_ Stiles thinks with a smile. Lately, since they decided to become official, Stiles has loved pressing Derek's buttons more than usual.

They really are trapped in a closet, literally, which is hilarious. They're facing away from each other, hands tied together with mountain ash rope behind their backs. The space they're confined in is so small that their chests nearly touch the parallel walls and the only light to see is filtering in through the slits of the door. On a side note, the trolls that had put them here were too dense to realize that Stiles was a spark in training and could escape whenever he wanted. And he kinda wants to, but he wants to milk this thing for all the bad jokes it's worth before Derek remembers that Stiles can do a lot of helpful magical things now.

Scott and the others are presumably still outside slicing through has many trolls as possible as quickly as possible. They're not nearly as much of a threat as the cheesy Steven Spielberg movies led Stiles to believe--more like an infuriating infestation that could occasionally result in innocent peoples' deaths. They're not quite malicious, more mischievous with a darker side than anything.

He gives a tiny tug to the rope. "What the hell? Why do so many of our enemies have these? Who even makes these? Is there some kind of mountain ash rope factory we don't know about?"

"Stiles, please, I'm begging you to be quiet while I try and think."

Stiles just rolls his eyes. "Do you think we could sneak a quickie in here before we escape?"

"Stiles, can you please disconnect from your lizard brain and focus?"

"Like, I could just wriggle a little, get my hands down the back of your pants, you know that thing you like when I make my fingers electric. So hot."

"Wait, Stiles, you-"

" _Dingdingdingding!_ " Stiles sings. "That's right, magical boyfriend is here to save the day again! Why do you always forget that I can do cool shit now?"

"Jesus Christ, Stiles! We've been stuck in here for ten minutes! Undo the ropes and stop acting like an idiot."

"Hey, I'm not David Blaine! I can't just go around untying ropes willy-nilly." Stiles doesn't need to see the blazing glare to know it's set in Derek's features. He snorts. "Okay, fine. It's not like we were in any real danger anyway."

Stiles fidgets against the rope and wiggles his fingers. He's practiced this enough times so that he doesn't even have to concentrate that hard, he just pictures it and the heavy rope loosens and falls to the ground with a thwap.

Derek is then quickly able to undo the knot tying his ankles together and kicks the door open. But before storming off to fight the tiny wrinkly faced assholes of the night, Derek spins him around and plants a heavy kiss on his lips and says, "Thanks for saving the day," much to Stiles' astonishment.

Instead of questioning the growth of Derek's social skills, he just smiles against the man's lips and shrugs. "I'm just a simple man trying to make my way through the universe."

Stiles can hear the muffled grunts of the pack ripping the trolls apart and the pained angry chirps of their decimation. It's gross and terrifying and hilarious all wrapped up into a not-so-pretty package. Just like his life.

Derek pulls back, head tilting to the side. "Scott just asked if you were making a reference to something."

Stiles shoves Derek away when the werewolf bends over and heaves a laugh.

"Oh for fuck's sake, Scott! Watch Star Wars already, you're an adult!"

It's not exactly a happily ever after, but he'll sure as hell take it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song is I Want a Little Sugar In My Bowl, by Nina Simone. I was gonna go with At Last by Etta James and bring it full circle but meh.
> 
> Lemme know in the comments for any mistakes!


End file.
